I Loved Her First
by Edward Carson
Summary: An exploration of the father-daughter relationship between Carson and Lady Mary from the beginning. "Even a butler has his favourites," Carson tells Mary early in Season 1. This story will follow them from the first time they set eyes on each other through the end of the series in 1926. Because their stories are intertwined, Mrs. Hughes eventually comes into it.
1. Chapter 1: Return of the Prodigal

**I LOVED HER FIRST** *

DISCLAIMER: I do not own, nor do I profit in any way from the use of, the characters or setting or narrative framework of _Downton Abbey_ as elaborated in the following story. All rights to these elements belong to Julian Fellowes. I am borrowing them in good faith.

 **Prologue: The Return of the Prodigal, Summer, 1884**

 **Downton Abbey**

The great house is visible from the top of the rise out of the village. The road curves around the edge of the estate for a good half mile before it gets to the drive, providing ample opportunity to drink in the splendour of Downton Abbey, itself on a small rise but surrounded by carefully cultivated grounds and strategically situated yews and firs, and all of it against a background of green woods and golden fields. It does his heart good to see the place again. But it is not until he steps onto the crushed gravel of the winding drive that wends its way up to the immaculately manicured gravel square at the front door that he really feels he's come home.

Downton. He was born and raised here and, except for his grammar school days when he was obliged to board weekdays in Ripon, he had not been away from it until his radical decision to throw over country ways and to seek adventure on the halls as part of a singing-dancing act that had performed up and down the northern counties, playing in towns, even some of the larger ones, and venturing as far north as Edinburgh on one disastrous occasion. When he had left the estate, it was with all the optimism of youth, unblighted by the possibility and experience of disappointment or failure, and thus with the idea of never coming back. Not permanently anyway. And yet now, here he was, only thirty-one months later, at the gates of Downton again. ******

He isn't here cap-in-hand exactly. He hasn't lost everything, is in debt to no one. He could have sought employment elsewhere. There are plenty of shops and factories, and he has an education, too, so might have secured a lower management post. He could even have gone on with the act, a different act at any rate, if he'd had a mind to do so. It would have taken some work to build up from scratch again and he'd have had to find a new partner - a _better_ partner, though it would have been difficult to find anyone _worse_ than Charlie Grigg - but what he didn't have was the heart for it. Whatever pleasure he had once drawn from the work, the halls would now always mean heartbreak and he isn't prepared to carry that.

And Downton is going to welcome him back. At least, Mr. Finch had responded favourably to his inquiry and Dad had told him the door was always open, told him in that offhand easy way of his, in so few words the note was hardly worth the postage except for what it meant. He doesn't know in quite what capacity he might again serve in the great house, but there will be something for him here.

No doubt the staff will think he's given up, failed, come crawling back to a serious job with real security and unquestioned respectability. Well, he will be glad to let them think that. It will relieve him of revealing the truth. If they've made their minds up, he won't have to enlighten them and they won't ask troubling questions. He won't have to talk about _her_.

In his circumstances, service is much more than a job. It also beckons as an escape. He knows he can spend his life here - the heights of domestic service were his ambition until the halls lured him away - and now there are other advantages. House servants don't marry - well, not if they intend to advance in the work. They commit themselves to the welfare of the estate family and it never crosses anyone's mind to suggest that they might do otherwise. He will never have to explain why he doesn't have a girl. This is important because he'll never want to risk his heart again, not as he did with Alice. He has never hurt - never been hurt - so badly. Here at Downton, he can turn his back on love. Here he can pursue ambition instead.

This fact propels him up the drive at a steady pace. He checks his timepiece as he rounds the house and makes for the coal yard. If he is careful, his timing will be perfect. It was one of his strengths on the halls. It might be proper to ring the bell and have the staff admit him, rather than pushing in, but they all know him, even if they don't all like him. He hasn't been gone _that_ long. And though he hasn't been formally offered a position, he has not lost the cockiness of his age that makes it impossible for him to anticipate rejection.

"Well, Charlie," he says to himself, as he pushes open the coal yard door, "you're _on_."

 **Mr. Finch**

Mr. Finch sits behind a large desk in the butler's pantry, bent over a great ledger, his fountain pen scratching away. He might be doing up the weekly accounts or making addendums in the wine book. The butler of Downton Abbey is fifty-eight years old, a tall, slim man whose age and slender build disguise levels of energy and strength that more than meet the physical requirements of this demanding position. The staff look on him with awe, not fear, although these are not always distinguishable. He is scrupulously honest and fair and His Lordship relies upon his good counsel. He looks, to the young man who now raps on his half-open door, exactly the same as he had when they last spoke, those many months ago.

The man looks up at the sound. His eyes rest for a long moment on the young man poised in the doorway. Charles Carson is twenty-four years old. He stands 6'1", the perfect height for a footman, and has as well good looks enough to make a positive impression in the dining room and at the front door - wavy black hair, bold dark eyes, an almost ruddy complexion that speaks to a physical vigour, broad shoulders, and a way of standing that gives him a magisterial bearing even in his modest attire and youthfulness.

The butler's eyes traverse him from head to toe, a reflexive impulse on the part of one who spends his days examining all things for imperfections. This completed, he glances at the large clock that sits on the corner of his desk. He is not surprised that it is _exactly_ ten a.m. Charles Carson has worked for him before. With a grunt, he stands up and, ignoring the pleasantries, strides to the door and pushes through it and past his visitor.

"His Lordship wants to see you," he says, over his shoulder.

 **His Lordship**

He follows Mr. Finch up the servants' staircase, through the green baize door, and into the library. Nothing has changed. His familiarity with the house is such that he could have navigated it blindfolded. He is hardly nonchalant about this interview with Lord Grantham, but neither is he apprehensive. His Lordship has always been kind to him. So he approaches this somewhat irregular encounter with curiosity more than anything else.

The Lord of the manor is, like his butler and all of his footmen and his only son, too, a tall man. Height in a male servant is considered a virtue, although it is possible to be _too_ tall as well. The important thing is not to overshadow His Lordship. Joseph Frederick Edmund Crawley, the Sixth Earl of Grantham, is also a well-built man, the consequence of a very physical life. ******* His Lordship rides every day, in the business of the estate and for pleasure, walks when he is not riding, and sits only when he cannot reasonably avoid it. He lives for the hunting season. Lord Grantham presides with dignity over the great dinners the house hosts and is well known for his social skills, although he would usually rather be elsewhere. Meals that encompass only the immediate family are more precipitate affairs, much to the chagrin of Her Ladyship, who thinks eating hastily a vulgar practice of the lower orders.

Lord Grantham sits at his writing desk and, as is his wont, he continues to scribble away for a moment after the butler and his charge appear before him. Keeping the staff waiting on him, if only briefly, is one of Lord Grantham's ways of reiterating social distinctions without a word spoken. The butler and the prodigal footman await his pleasure in silence. Finally His Lordship looks up.

"Good morning, Charles."

He isn't Charlie Carson any more. In the great houses, footmen are known by their first names and only the formal version of their names may be used. He doesn't mind. The name Charlie is one more vestige of his life on the halls that he will be glad to shed. And being called Charles almost assuredly means he has secured a place.

The young man makes a short bow. "My lord."

His Lordship stares at him for a long moment, performing a similar visual examination to that made by Mr. Finch downstairs. Charles feels no discomfort at this. He knows that physical appearance - not merely looks, but also deportment and attention to sartorial detail - are important elements in a footman. It is not enough to be skilled. One must also present well.

"It is good to see you looking so well."

"Thank you. And you, my lord." The young man has been well schooled in the genteel manners of service.

"Finch tells me that you would like to return to Downton, Charles."

"I would, my lord, at your pleasure."

"Have you been to see your father yet?"

Charles shakes his head. "No, my lord. He knows I was to arrive today and I will see him later."

His Lordship nods at this. "He may hope you will join him in his work in the stables."

To one who was not so well acquainted with His Lordship, it might have seemed a discouragement to prospects of service in the house. But Charles has known Lord Grantham all his life and is comfortable with him, if in a very formal sense. This is his opportunity to make his own case and he seizes it.

"My lord, the stables at Downton are in the very best of hands. My father knows no equal in the length and breadth of Yorkshire - I would venture to say in all of England - in the management of stables and the care of horses. He will only employ the very best to assist him. My talents lie in domestic service, my lord, and it is there that I seek my future." He speaks slowly and clearly, enunciating his words crisply in that manner he learned in the grammar school. If he says perhaps a little too much, it is in part to remind His Lordship of his sonorous voice, one that will sound impressive in the great hall of Downton Abbey, announcing visitors. If anything, working on the halls has helped him to groom his vocal skills. It is not a bad thing to demonstrate one's talents in an interview for a position.

His Lordship's gaze flickers briefly in the direction of his butler. Charles does not give in to an impulse to do likewise. Speaking this boldly to His Lordship is one thing, and he calculates that it will have a positive effect. Mr. Finch is something else.

"I think you sell yourself short there, Charles," His Lordship says finally. "Your father trained you well. I would trust _some_ of my horses in your hands." He laughs at his own joke and elicits an acknowledging smile from the young man. Mr. Finch remains impassive. One of the prerogatives of his senior position and long acquaintance with His Lordship is that he does not have to salute every humorous effort on his master's part. "But Finch speaks highly of you as well, and may find a use for you in the house."

And that, it seems, is all His Lordship wants to say. He nods to Mr. Finch and then turns back to his desk, picking up his fountain pen. Charles looks to the butler for direction.

"You may return to the servants' hall now, Charles, and look out a livery."

He is swept with a wave of satisfaction and is, as well, a little relieved. He had been confident of the outcome of this interview, but it is always pleasant to be on the other side of it.

"You might want to look in on your father before you take up your duties," His Lordship suggests, with a glance over his shoulder.

Charles looks to Mr. Finch for an approving nod on this. Whatever His Lordship says, it is the butler who rules his life now. Securing an almost imperceptible acknowledgment, he turns to His Lordship once more. "My lord." He executes the formalities smoothly and retires from the room.

 **His Lordship's Plan**

As the door closes behind him, Lord Grantham turns again and the butler and his gentleman lock eyes.

"Well?"

There is no more formal relationship at Downton than the one between the man who manages the house and the man who owns the estate, but they have worked together for a quarter of a century and they always speak their minds to each other when alone.

"He's a fine footman, my lord. We already knew that. And if he settles back into the work, I do not doubt that he'll soon be the best footman. But I gather you've got something else in mind."

"Not something else, Finch. Something more. There have been Carsons at Downton since my grandfather's day."

"In the stables."

"Yes, in the stables. _Running_ the stables. And, as young Charles has told us, never anyone better. But he believes his future lies in service."

"And this dalliance with the circus? You don't think it tells against him?" For Finch, all the lower forms of public entertainment - circus, the halls, street minstrels - run together. The butler's tone is neutral. He is asking a question, not attempting to influence His Lordship's thinking.

Lord Grantham pauses in reflection for a moment, his fingers idly manipulating the pen. "I've known Charles all his life, Finch, as have you. I've always liked him. He was a cheerful, steady lad. Always reliable, always respectful. You yourself never had a bad word to say about him as a hall boy or a junior footman."

"That is true, my lord, but he's been more than two years on the halls..."

"You speak with such odium, Finch. As vulgar as the stage may be, it's not hard labour in a prison ship. And I think it speaks well of the fellow that he struck out on his own, tried something different, saw something of the world. That he has returned tells me he has a capacity for growth, maturity. I hope he has learned a little of what is important. Perhaps he has had a few disappointments. That builds character. Now he wants a life, a career. And I intend to help him achieve that."

"And your precise plan, my lord?"

Lord Grantham shifts in his chair that he might look directly into his butler's eyes. "I want you to train him as your successor, Finch."

To another man such a statement might have come as a shock with the implication of replacement. But Finch knows his master well. He has no fears for his own position. "There are already many skilled butlers in the land, my lord. He is too young."

"You're not in the grave yet, Finch. Indeed, we may both hope you will not be there for many years yet to come. I was thinking of my son."

"My lord?"

"I have brought my son up with a clear understanding of his responsibilities with regard to Downton. He knows his duty and he will do it, and admirably in the bargain. But it is an immense task and not something that any one man can manage alone. One needs good staff. My son must look to the broader concerns of the estate. He must have in the house someone who knows what he's about, someone reliable. As I have had."

It is as close to a compliment as Lord Grantham ever gets and Finch bows his head in recognition of it. They do get on.

"As I am raising a son to this work, Finch, I want you to raise a butler. Put him in every job in the house from the bottom up. He must understand every level to manage it all. Send him away at the proper moment to learn some of the finer arts in the most appropriate places." He pauses. "This may involve a trip to the continent."

Finch nods. The best wine training to be had is, unfortunately, across the Channel.

"Teach him to deal with staff. He has a congenial personality, but he will need to learn leadership. We want neither a doormat nor a tyrant. Educate him to the nuances of _benevolent_ tyranny." They exchange a knowing look at that. They each believe themselves past-masters of that particular practice.

"We are fortunate in his formal education, my lord," Finch notes. "He has advanced skills in organization, mathematics, book-keeping, in addition to the manners of someone well above his rank."

"His parents did well by him," His Lordship agrees, but is not yet finished his litany. "Give him responsibilities, test him, but do not give him too much that he gets discouraged. I want, when the time comes, for him to step into your shoes as smoothly as possible and to be in a position to give exemplary service to my son."

It is Finch's role to provide His Lordship with sound advice, so he cannot forbear to add one more _caveat_. "The others will be jealous, my lord."

This prompts a raised eyebrow on His Lordship's part, reflecting an unsympathetic interest in this point. "We're not running a popularity contest, Finch. Teach him to manage jealousy."

His Lordship asks a great deal. In the short term it will be the butler, not the favoured footman, who will have to soothe troubled egos. But Finch has enough confidence in his own abilities to accomplish any task that is set him. "I will do my best, my lord," he says formally.

This evokes a satisfied smile from His Lordship. "Then we will certainly achieve our purpose. And Finch."

The butler raises his head attentively.

"Let his sojourn on the halls lie. He has turned his back on it and so should we."

"Very good, my lord."

 **Dad**

Dad is where Charles expects him to be - in the stables, attending to his horses. Dad loves the horses. Even Grandad, who had surrendered the job of head groom to his son, always said that Dad had a special touch with the horses. When he moves among them in the stables or crosses a field where they are grazing, they whinny to him like old friends calling across the way, and if he gives them any encouragement at all they will congregate around him in the field and he is late for wherever he's going because they all want their share of attention. He has seen almost all of them into the world and is there whenever any of them leave it, too. His loving touch follows them from the cradle to the grave. Charles was not making an idle boast when he told His Lordship that there was no better horse man in Yorkshire than Frank Carson.

He is a Yorkshireman, Dad is, the old kind, speaking only when necessary and then only to communicate something useful. Charles knows his father loves him, cherishes him even - the only surviving child, one of two born to the family. But the man has never said so in words. This is only how the men are around here and no one expects anything different. Everyone knows that a Yorkshireman feels deeply, even if he's not always gabbing about it. He also speaks in the old tongue.

"Tha' hast come back," he says, looking up from a harness that he's been polishing until the leather shines and the brass fittings gleam. His voice holds no more emotion than if he'd just seen his son over breakfast that morning, although they've not set eyes on each other in months. When Charles had announced his intention to go on the halls, his father had just shaken his head. He didn't believe in telling other men what to do, even if that other man was his son. If the lad'd run off to sing and dance at fourteen, well, that would have been another matter. But at twenty-one he could make up his own mind.

Charles and his father no longer speak the same language. He can still do the thick Yorkshire brogue if it comes to it, but his parents have discouraged him from it. They'd sent him to grammar school to learn a different way and they were proud that he'd learned it.

They exchange only a few words now, only enough for the father to hear that his son has been restored to a post at the big house. Frank Carson says nothing to the fact that Charles will start again at the bottom of the ladder. He expects no differently. Nor does he ask questions about why the lad - his father only ever infrequently calls him by name, preferring 'lad' - has come back. It is a fact. It doesn't need explanation. Life in service keeps a man busy, but the stables demand long days as well. They will be close by and will see each other as opportunity presents - they do enjoy each other's company - and that is good enough.

As he turns back to the house, Charles's thoughts turn to his mother. She died four years ago, before he went away, of a fever, one of those inexplicable ailments that come out of nowhere, wreak havoc, and then dissipate. She never knew about his time on the halls, but he thinks she would have encouraged him, if only with a look in her eye and a discreet smile. She was always singing. He misses her. And he can see, even in this brief exchange with his father, that _he_ misses her still. Well, it is only to be expected. Theirs was a happy marriage. Charles had grown up in a happy home. But now his father is alone and lonely. He has his horses, to be sure, but as satisfying as they are to the elder Carson, they can't mend his heart. Even when it works out, love is painful.

 **Goodbye to Alice**

He will be sharing with Simon. Mr. Finch tells him this and then leaves him to find the room on his own. He doesn't need directions. He's lived here before. It is four flights up to the servants' quarters in the attics.

After putting his few things away, he looks for a long time at the photograph that he takes from the inner pocket of his jacket. It is a portrait of a lovely young woman. The most beautiful woman he has ever seen. Alice Neal. He has loved her. He still loves her. And wishes her well. But he'll never be the same for knowing her because she has broken his heart and taken with her all of his dreams. With her have gone not only his capacity to love another, but also his joy in the crowds and the songs and the excitement of a life lived in the minute. If he cannot have Alice, even the hope of Alice, then he cannot have the halls either. He must put it all away together.

Alice hadn't taken Charlie. No, that rascal could shoulder his own share of responsibility in this mess. He is glad to have seen the back of _that_ charlatan. If only it had not been Charlie for whom Alice had forsaken him. Anyone else and...

He stops himself. No more of that now. It is over and done with. A door closed. A heart turned to stone.

It won't be easy, but the job will help a lot. It will give him structure, discourage emotional indulgence, open the door to ambition. He's tried for a different life and failed. Now he is home again, back where he belongs. Mr. Finch has told him that he will be the most junior footman - sixth of six. When he left Downton, he'd been fourth, but you can't go away and expect someone to keep your place open for you, not for more than two years. Not for two weeks, even. It is a little disconcerting to start at the bottom again. But Mr. Finch has intimated that there is more to it than the rules of seniority, although he won't explain until it is appropriate to do so.

Charles is grateful. They've taken him back when they've no obligation to do so. Perhaps it's because they - His Lordship and Mr. Finch - think so highly of Dad. As well they should. His father is one of the most respected men on the estate. There is a lot to be said for that kind of regard. But it doesn't really matter _why_ he's gotten the position, but only that he _has_ got it. Even if he has to start at the lower end of the table, he knows he won't be stuck there, not like some. One day, he tells himself, he is going to be the butler of Downton Abbey. And returning to service doesn't mean he will be abandoning entirely the elements that drew him onto the halls. Isn't there an innate theatricality to the doings of a big house like Downton Abbey? with the footman all starched and on display, performing for the guests? and the role of butler - the ultimate thespian challenge? Mr. Finch takes pride in doing things properly - the way he dresses and speaks, how he orchestrates the presentation of a meal, the investiture of every ritual with a dramatic quality - because he understands the impact of even small details on any observer. It is all a great show, if heavier on setting and drama than singing and dancing.

But his ambition is, if obtainable, decades away. For now he has to concentrate on the job at hand. He will pour all his energies into it. He will close off his heart and open his mind, rejecting the distractions of love.

He puts the photograph into the small box that houses a few other mementoes of his time on the halls - a dance hall program on which his - _their_ \- act is listed; a pressed flower, the one he wore during their most memorable run in Nottingham; some scribbled notes of jokes. Then he closes the lid and pushes the box to the back of the wardrobe. He is done with all that now.

 ***A/N 1.** The title of this story, "I Loved Her First," comes from a song by Heartland that _pinkosmondfan_ used as the soundtrack to a beautiful fan video entitled "mary and carson," which may be found on Youtube. The song itself deals with a father-daughter relationship and thus it is a perfect fit for the father-daughter relationship between Carson and Mary. The video uses clips only from the first two seasons. It is worth watching

"I Loved Her First" is the story I've been wanting to write ever since Season 1. I've been holding onto the title for my extended exploration of Carson and Mary which begins with this Prologue. And while there is no Mary _yet_ , she is on the immediate horizon.

 ****A/N 2.** Now that we are beyond _Downton Abbey_ , I think it is possible to take a little license with the literal canon. I have done so here with Carson's background and in a way that is consistent with my description of this in other stories. Carson, in my _Downton Abbey_ world, was born in 1860 on the estate and grew up there. His father and grandfather were head grooms to Robert's father and grandfather. Carson has a grammar school education, but also served briefly as a hallboy before becoming a junior footman. Then, at age 21, he left Downton in order to go on the halls, where he remained for almost three years, returning to the estate at the beginning of this story. These details stray from the sparse details about Carson's chronology and background provided in _Downton Abbey_ itself and in some of the books produced about it, most notably in the foreword written by Julian Fellowes to _Downton Abbey: Rules for Household Staff_ , wherein a background biography for Carson may be found. If you piece together Julian Fellowes's chronology, you will find it sometimes does not make sense. So instead of trying to write a fictional life for Carson that takes into account the occasionally confusing "facts" of canon, I am adhering to my own version. It will have an internal consistency, if nothing else.

 ***** A/N 3.** I haven't found a name for the Dowager's husband in canon, so he is now - in my world anyway - Joseph Frederick Edmund Crawley. (I checked out a list of popular male names in the mid-19th century.) I have identified him as the Sixth Earl of Grantham, which will make his son Robert the Seventh Earl of Grantham. Julian Fellowes has not been entirely consistent on this throughout the series, and Jessica Fellowes, in the various companion volumes, has used Fifth and Seventh for Robert. But Robert as the Seventh Earl makes more sense. I've also pulled a name for Carson's father - Frank Carson - out of the thin air.


	2. Chapter 2: First Sight

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **Chapter 1 First Sight**

 _It was love at first sight. That's what he's told himself over the years and how he puts it when he tells Mrs. Hughes, the only person in whom he ever confides it. But it's not quite true_.

 **A Child Born**

Mary Josephine Crawley. She was born in the small hours of a bitterly cold February night, inconveniencing everyone from her grandparents who waited up in the library, to the doctor who came to the birthing room exhausted from treating an outbreak of fever, to the Abbey staff who gathered below stairs, as anxious as the family for the news. Of those who waited through the frigid night only her father was unaffected by time of day or the weather. Robert Crawley was too consumed with the apprehensions of any man in those nerve-wracking hours of helplessness to notice or care about such extraneous details.

The birth of a first child was a momentous event in the history of any of the great landed families for much rode on it. In the servants' hall, no less than in the library upstairs, all were curious about the capacity of the young Viscount's even younger American wife to do her duty. Even Mr. Finch was caught up in the drama and in consequence took an uncharacteristically broad view of the whole situation, turning a blind eye to the pool some of the footmen started on the child's sex, weight, and time of birth. Charles Carson, now the senior footman of six, was more overtly disapproving of the younger men's distraction, for his dancehall days had taught him to beware gambling, but he was no less absorbed in the tensions of the moment. It was not every day that an heir was born.

The news of the child's birth sent a palpable wave of relief over the lot of them, followed by another of good cheer and warm words for the mother and her healthy baby.

"Bless them both," declared the cook, Mrs. Yardley. She was a sharp-tongued woman most of the time, but she'd known too many young women - and their children - to die in childbirth ever to be anything but grateful for the survival of both.

There were murmurings of agreement as the staff dispersed to their beds, with only a few hours' sleep ahead for the scullery maids who would be up before dawn. One of them would be lucky enough to be laying the fire in the newly-established nursery on the gallery and so the first to set eyes on the latest addition to the Crawley family.

Though expressions of relief and gratitude were offered in abundance, there was yet a limit to the exuberance of the staff's reaction. All was not quite as joyous as it might have been for the child was, after all, a girl. And whatever blessings she might bring down on her family in future years, she could not inherit the estate and the title. The succession was still not secure. The Viscount and his wife would have to try again.

Charles was as glad of the news as the rest. He and Viscount Crawley had long been familiars, having grown up in near proximity on the estate. They had become closer in the past year during a six-month stint in which Charles had served as the Viscount's valet. Such an association naturally fostered a greater personal amity between them. It was only ever a temporary assignment, part of some grand plan hatched between His Lordship and Mr. Finch, a plan that had also sent Chares to France for ten months the year before that for training in the wine industry. He was aware now, though neither men had made it explicit, that he was being groomed for a post as butler. Their confidence in him was gratifying, if a little precipitous. As confident as he was in his skills, he knew no other footman who had advanced so quickly.

Charles distinctly remembered from his own childhood the birth of Robert Arthur Joseph the Viscount Crawley and the joy that event that evoked on the estate and in the village, prompting celebrations to mark the birth of an heir. There had been fireworks. But he knew that as warmly as Robert Crawley would welcome his first child, there must be some element of disappointment. It was the first duty of the heir - and his wife - to produce an heir in their turn. The Crawleys would love their child, cherish the little girl safely born to them, but... Charles's thoughts drifted to His Lordship and Her Ladyship, who might be a little less than elated by the fact that their eldest grandchild was a girl. The pressure for an heir was so great.

Charles's attachment to the family heightened his sensitivity to this functional element of the birth. And so, although he was pleased for her parents, he was not initially moved by the sight of the little girl. She was a baby and he knew little enough of them, his only sibling having died when he himself was a small child. His first glimpses of Miss Mary - swaddled tightly and firmly held in nanny's experienced arms or, less confidently and more rarely, in the arms of her young mother - elicited from him only polite smiles and failed to provide any portent of things to come.

If it had been put to him in those first few weeks that this wisp of a being would mend his heart and teach him to love again, he would have dismissed the notion as a preposterous one. And he would have been quite wrong.

 **A Heart Touched**

The bell rang for the library. The three junior footmen gathered at the foot of the table were enjoying a rare moment of calm and the bell startled them. They looked at each other and then at the senior footman who sat by himself farther along. Without waiting for a direction from him, all three leaped to their feet.

Charles waved them down and went himself. The task upstairs was probably more appropriate to one of them, but they'd spent every spare moment of the past week polishing the endless array of silver dishes and utensils that would be employed on the great occasion of the baby's upcoming baptism, and they were tired. Mr. Finch had impressed upon him that effective leadership included mucking in every once in a while. He was attentive to such lessons.

As he climbed the stairs he wondered why they had rung at all. It was the 'family hour' above stairs, that single hour of the day when the child was brought down from the nursery all starched and polished to spend time with her parents. And grandparents. It was a topic of some discreet discussion downstairs, largely between the housekeeper and the cook whom Mr. Finch did not often cross, about the advisability of the Viscount and his wife living at Downton Abbey instead of taking up residence at one of the smaller houses on the estate or in the village, such as Crawley House. The received wisdom suggested that it was never good for a couple to live in such close proximity to the parents of either, no matter how big the house. A mixed marriage - between a British aristocrat and an American _nouvelle riche_ \- was already complicated. But the Viscount had insisted. He didn't want to leave his home. This only contributed to speculation over the nature of the marriage, which was largely seen - if rarely openly commented upon - as a union of status and wealth, rather than love.

Charles pushed thoughts of that kind from his mind. Although he knew more than most about the subject, his term as valet having fallen during a crucial moment of the Viscount's marital negotiations, he believed it was his duty to forget such delicate details. He sought a mental distraction and found it momentarily in the contemplation of this concept of the 'family hour.' It was the peculiar practice of the aristocracy, this distancing from their own children, leaving their upbringing largely in the hands of a stranger. The children of commoners grew up under their parents' feet, attending the local parish school, and following, more often than not, in their parents' vocational footsteps. Charles's own path had diverged from this a little, in terms of both education and life's work, but he had spent a lot of time with his parents.

So far as Charles could tell, from conversations overheard and observations made, Lord Grantham was benignly indifferent to this addition to the family. It was doubtful whether he would have been any more demonstrably interested had the child been a boy, at least at this point. His Lordship appeared to adhere to the maxim that children were to be neither seen nor heard until they were old enough to learn to ride. Her Ladyship showed more interest, but this manifested itself more in kind words than any hands-on involvement. And she frowned just a little at the vocal enthusiasm of her daughter-in-law who, she had murmured to her husband, had not _yet_ learned to control her emotions. The young parents were both attentive to their daughter, so far as the strictures of their world permitted, and Charles had seen them both stopping her carriage in the park and cooing over her as nanny kept a careful watch. It certainly was not the way he had been raised.

And yet the hour after tea was sacrosanct. In that hour the family fended for themselves, giving their servants a late-afternoon break and a moment for their own tea. Even nanny enjoyed this brief respite. But someone had rung the bell so they wanted something.

He could hear the baby bawling well before he opened the library door. She had powerful lungs. He found His Lordship and Her Ladyship ensconced, as they usually were at this time of day, on the sofa by the fire. His Lordship was concealed behind a newspaper, possibly hoping that this might distance him from the caterwauling child. Her Ladyship was staring across the room at her son with an expression that combined indignation and alarm, neither of which had moved her to action.

Charles observed his employers only in passing for his attention was drawn more immediately to the other occupants of the room and, in particular, to the child who sounded wretched unhappy and seemed determined to inform the world of her dissatisfaction. Nanny was not present, which was no surprise, but neither was the Viscountess anywhere to be seen. Instead, the poor child squirmed in the arms of her father, whose awkward grip on her indicated how little practice he had had of this particular task and who seemed likely to drop her at any moment. Robert Crawley's face was as flushed as that of his child's and as agitated. This was understandable for was there anything as harrowing as the screams of a distraught child?

Mr. Finch stood beside the father and daughter, although he was not really standing so much as fluttering, and was clearly out of his depth. He had faced a myriad of challenges in his time as butler of Downton Abbey, and conquered them all, but there had not been a child in residence in decades and an aging bachelor butler was of even less use in such a circumstance than a novice father. For Charles, the vividness of Mr. Finch's discomfort was as startling as anything else.

It was not immediately clear who had rung the bell or why, so Charles advanced to Mr. Finch's side for direction.

"How may I help?" he inquired softly. He spoke to the butler, but his presence caught Robert Crawley's attention.

"Here!" he said, the desperation in his voice umistakable. "Take her. Please! I don't think she..." He did not finish his sentence but, without waiting for a response, thrust the child into the arms of the footman.

Charles was not at all prepared. Nor could he ever have been, for this was a wholly unprecedented development. The tiny bundle of squalling humanity roared her fury, perhaps at the indignity of being handed off, or perhaps instinctively apprehending that she had been relegated to even less competent arms. The footman had no idea what to do. He had never held a baby. Her fragility frightened him out of his wits.

There was no time for rational judgment, which was probably just as well for, like the two overwrought men beside him, he would only have over-thought it. Instead, he gave way to instinct. He tightened his arms around the twisting tot, drawing her close to his chest to ensure that he did not drop her. At the same time, he moved away from the blazing fire and the array of flickering candles on the mantlepiece and retreated into the shadows by the windows. Without thinking, he also began to hum, though he couldn't have identified the tune.

And in the diminished glow of the now-distant firelight, he looked at her for the first time.

Two tiny, perfect hands, now clenched, now waving even tinier, perfect fingers - the perfect number on each hand - captured his gaze. His thumb was bigger than one of her hands. Her nose was a work of art. He was given to noticing noses as he had, as a youth, been only too aware of his own which was outlandishly large. He could not help but notice her tongue, a little pink sliver that quivered in the rage to which it gave such full voice. An elegant little white cap covered her head, concealing what hair she might have, but it lay askew on her head, the result of her fierce struggles, and this gave him a glimpse of one ear. Could any craftsman born have formed something so exquisite?

And then her mouth closed abruptly and the eyes that had been screwed up in indignant wrath unexpectedly opened. The suddenness of her gaze - though she could hardly really be focusing on him, could she? - fairly took his breath away. He was not aware that he had stopped humming, that his mouth had fallen open, and that he was staring at her.

He had fallen oblivious to everything - to her screams, now faded to an almost imperceptible lip-smacking, or to the agitated conversations of the harried adults behind him. He was, in fact, no longer aware that there was anyone else in the room until he felt a presence at his side. It was Robert Crawley, looking vastly more relieved and rather more like himself. His eyes, too, were fixed on the child's mesmerizing countenance.

"She is lovely, isn't she," he said softly, an awed note in his voice. It wasn't a question.

For a long moment, the two men stood shoulder to shoulder, transfixed.

And then, their minds working in unconscious tandem, the one held out his arms and the other handed into them the now placid child.

Reality descended on them abruptly. Behind them the voices were raised again and there was a bit of a rush. A flustered nanny, summoned from her tea, was there, and father and daughter and attendant drew away. Charles was aware of animated exchanges - why nanny had been interrupted, how the Viscountess had been taken ill, why the baby had erupted so dramatically, what on earth were they feeding her to have precipitated such an outburst (this from Her Ladyship) - but he heard none of it. None of it mattered. The only thing that meant anything in the moment was that small face turned up to his, those captivating eyes that had not even really focused on him.

He was smitten. And they had not even been properly introduced.


	3. Chapter 3: Affection Takes Root

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **DISCLAIMER:** I do not own, nor do in any way profit from the use of, the characters, settings, suggested plot lines, or ideas drawn from _Downton Abbey_. These belong to Julian Fellowes and Carnival Films.

 **Chapter 2 An Affection Takes Root**

It seemed as though he'd only just gotten to sleep after an already late night when someone was shaking him awake again.

"Charles!" There was an urgency in the young voice that permeated his slumber and drew him back to consciousness. It was one of the hallboys, Geoffrey. In the other bed, across the room, Simon rolled over noisily and uttered an oath Charles had never heard him speak aloud, but did not awaken.

"What is it?" Charles pushed himself into a sitting position and squinted against the light cast by the flickering flame of the candle in the boy's hand. He wasn't pleased to have his sleep interrupted, but his tone was a polite one nevertheless. Civility was a necessity when so many people lived in such close quarters. And the boy would not be troubling him with a trifle.

"His Lordship wants you," the boy said agitatedly. "Right now!"

The words prompted Charles to action. He threw off his scratchy wool blankets and reached for his clothes, ignoring the shock to his system prompted by abandoning the warmth of his bed for the cool air and colder floor of the room on a night in late March. The candle offered little general illumination, but Charles did not need light to put his hands on what he required. His things were always neatly hung up or folded and ready to hand. As he pulled on his trousers, his attention turned to the messenger.

"What's it about, Geoffrey?"

"Don't know," the boy said, covering a yawn. He'd probably nodded off himself down in the servants' hall and even an invigorating run up several flights of stairs had not roused him entirely. "But His Lordship's awfully crabby. He said to get you straight away. Hurry!"

Despite the circumstances, Charles smiled at the boy's prodding. Hallboys seldom got any glory. In fact, they seldom got anything at all. During the day they did the trifling menial tasks that were beneath the dignity of the lowest footman, and then were obliged to stand the night-shift, in rotation, in the servants' hall, lest some member of the family need something in the middle of the night. It was a thankless job, the only reward being promotion - for the luckiest of them - to junior footman when they reached an appropriate age and if there was a vacancy. The less fortunate drifted away to labouring jobs elsewhere on the estate.

Although it took a few minutes, Charles dressed completely, if not entirely properly, making sure to put on his socks as well as shoes, but pulling his livery jacket over his pajama shirt. He did not know what task His Lordship might have for him and wanted to be ready for any contingency. If he was to run into the village for the doctor, or dash down to the stables, or any other errand that took His Lordship's fancy - although why he had summoned the senior _footman_ at this hour, when he had a butler and a valet and several other footmen besides, Charles did not know - then he wanted to be prepared. In service, the family came first, but sick servants were of no use to anybody.

He did not light his own candle, but followed Geoffrey, who led him down the servants' staircase to the door that opened onto the gallery, and thence to the door of His Lordship's dressing room. Charles appreciated the boy's diligence, although it was not necessary. Such was the intimate knowledge he had of the Abbey that he could have navigated his way in complete darkness.

The gallery was astir with activity although it was past two o'clock in the morning. There was a flurry of figures at the open nursery door, their shadows flickering in the glow of the candlelight within. The baby was bawling, a sound to wrench any heart. When she paused to take a breath, Charles discerned the voices of the Viscount and Viscountess, hers a higher, strained pitch at odds with her usual more lilting tone, and nanny's, too, of course. He wondered at the parents being up with the baby. Caring for the child, especially at night, was nanny's job. Perhaps this was Lady Cora's influence. They might do things differently in America. But Charles had no time to ponder this mystery. His business was with His Lordship, so he tapped on the dressing room door and then went in.

Charles was not at all surprised that His Lordship was sleeping in his dressing room. Separate bedrooms were, he understood, a common practice among the aristocracy. It was a mark of rank to observe it. Commoners did not usually have the luxury of space to indulge themselves this way. There were, perhaps, practical advantages - a snoring partner did not disturb the other when a couple slept apart. But though he seldom questioned the eccentricities of the ruling class, Charles wondered if in this they somehow missed the point of marriage. Still, it was not for him to judge.

The footman was a little startled to find the usually imperturbable Joseph Crawley in a state of high agitation. His Lordship was pacing the room like a man awaiting execution, wringing his hands. On the bedside table an open bottle of whisky and a half-full tumbler gave further evidence of His Lordship's disquiet. Why, Charles wondered, had he not summoned his valet, Mr. Bevin?

His Lordship looked up sharply as the footman entered the room.

"Charles! Thank goodness. Forgive me for prevailing upon you at this ghastly hour..." The footman's quiet protest that he was at His Lordship's service went unheard as the man forged ahead. "It's the child, Charles. Be a good chap, see if you can do something."

Charles wondered if he had heard correctly. Of all the tasks he might have anticipated from His Lordship and at this hour of the night, he would never have imagined this. In fact, he was not really clear on what he as being asked to do. "My lord?"

Joseph Crawley made an impatient gesture toward the door. "It's been almost three hours, Charles. Three hours!" He combed both hands through his wavy grey-brown hair, a sign of some consternation. The disheveled state of his hair suggested that he had done this more than once already.

It was difficult to ignore the wailing. Even with the nursery several doors down the corridor, the sound carried. Charles briefly wondered at the child's staying power. No one could go on like that forever. Surely she would _eventually_ cry herself to sleep.

"I cannot bear it any longer," His Lordship went on, a note of desperation in his voice. "I never could." He sat down heavily on his bed, staring into a dim corner of the room. "I remember it from school days. Children crying... All the small personal agonies." He looked up at the footman. "Do something about it, will you?" His tone was almost plaintive.

Well, now he had some explanation for His Lordship's distress. Charles had attended Ripon Grammar School as a boy and had to board there during the week. He had not liked being away from his parents and his home, but it had been quite bearable and, for an eleven-year old, a bit of an adventure. But His Lordship, and his son the Viscount, had been sent away to school at a much earlier age, another of those eccentric practices of the aristocracy that commoners could neither afford nor understand. And one seldom heard happy tales from such places. Some twisted logic held that a superior education involved isolation, deprivation, and bullying, the theory being, one supposed, that having survived school, a British aristocrat could take on the world. The Empire was arguably tangible evidence for this approach. Yet cracks appeared suggesting that it was not quite such a perfect calculation. And His Lordship's almost nervous collapse here in response to a baby's cry spoke to this.

Charles remained perplexed as to the meaning of His Lordship's directive. "My lord?" he said again, seeking clarification.

Lord Grantham made an impatient sound. "What you did in the library. Last week. Just...quiet her."

Ah. Now he understood, although this hardly erased his unease. "Surely nanny can manage..."

"Three hours, Charles!" His Lordship interrupted him. "They're all hopeless. Poor thing is exasperated with them all, and I don't blame her one bit! Give it a go, man. Please."

There was nothing for it but to try, no matter how awkward and inappropriate it was to do so, and Charles knew that it was both. He was also a little alarmed at His Lordship's faith in his abilities. He had done nothing in the library. He had no skills, no magical abilities. It had been a matter of being in the right place at the right time. Yet he believed his first duty lay with His Lordship and whatever he might ask, and though this request exceeded reasonable demands - and was something he could legitimately refuse to do - his allegiance to His Lordship was such that he would not decline.

Still, he walked down the corridor with more than a little reluctance. As he approached the nursery, he could heard the voices more clearly and they _all_ sounded in a right state. But above them all were the still-powerful cries of the unhappy little girl.

 _Three hours!_ Who could maintain such an expression of distress for so long? And what was wrong that she was so unsettled? He wondered that they had not called the doctor long 'ere this. Better a doctor than a footman. Yet he felt a wave of compassion for the child and this, more than anything else, gave him the boldness to step up to the door where he almost collided with Robert Crawley who emerged suddenly from the room.

They were both startled.

"What...?" Robert spluttered.

"His Lordship sent me to ask if I might be of any assistance, my lord." The peculiarity of the circumstances could not shift Charles from the formality that relations between master and servant demanded.

Robert Crawley's face, already flushed with agitation, darkened still further. "Bloody hell!"

Charles knew the Viscount to be one of the most even-tempered of men and recognized this display of anger as evidence that he was coming to the end of his tether. That the words were accompanied by a sharp glance down the corridor told the footman that the younger man's irritation was focused elsewhere.

Charles could do nothing - notwithstanding His Lordship's direction - without permission from the Viscount, not that he had any idea of what he could do. But he felt he had to say something.

"Is Miss Mary ill, my lord? Should I summon the doctor?"

The practical questions, put in a dispassionate tone, pulled Robert out of his distraction. "No, not exactly. It's colic. She's had it several nights past, but this is the worst. Apparently lots of babies get it. It makes them miserable. It makes everyone around them miserable. The doctor says there isn't anything that can be done about it."

Colic.

Although he knew nothing about babies, Charles had grown up around horses and watched as his father soothed and comforted animals afflicted with the various forms of this ailment.

"Have you been walking her?" he asked.

Perhaps there was an inadvertent note of confidence in his voice that caught the ear of the desperate father. Robert would have had to be desperate indeed to turn for help to an unmarried and childless footman with no record of experience in this area. "No," he said. "Lady Cora has been rocking her. And nanny has tried warm milk and even a little brandy. And God knows what else." He winced as the baby's wails suddenly reached a crescendo again. Robert closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Then he turned back into the nursery again and indicated that Charles should follow him.

It was a scene that spoke of tension and fraught nerves. In the blaze of several candles, Charles quickly took in the exhaustion and despair on the faces of the two women, an all-too-common sight in the late-night world of novice parents and untested nannies. Lady Cora held the baby tightly in her arms and had the rocking chair moving rather frenetically. Her eyes were as tear-filled as the child's. Nanny hovered helplessly at her side, clearly at a loss. Robert Crawley went to stand by his wife, his frustration evident in the clutching and un-clutching of his hands. There was nothing wrong. No one had made a mistake. They were just over-tired and frustrated, driven to the edge by their inability to make things better for the child they all longed to relieve.

In years gone by, Charles had encountered the same sort of atmosphere in the stables when a horse had failed to respond to cursory remedies for colic. He'd seen a few men reduced to tears in frustration, and at least one resort to brutality. His father was a different sort, exhibiting an infinite patience with the animals within his charge and demonstrating the curative power of tranquillity when nothing else could be done.

To Charles's mind, untutored as it was in the ways of babies, this situation demanded just such a calm hand more than anything else. And it was difficult for anyone to remain unruffled when they were worried and frustrated and, most of all, tired. This lot, Viscount, Viscountess, and nanny, looked done in. They were all of them, baby included, in need of some respite. Without thinking, he held his arms out toward the baby who twisted uncomfortably in her mother's grasp, her back awkwardly arched, her little face convulsed in protest. It was a mark of Lady Cora's despair that she obligingly gave up her baby into the hands of this untried servant.

There was no immediate, magical transformation in the child's bearing, but there might have been a collective sigh of relief on the part of the other three adults. Their nerves had all been stretched to the breaking point and the mere presence of someone with a calmer demeanour brought the level of tension down a notch.

Charles did not know what to do with a baby. He only knew what he had seen his father do with the horses. How often had he watched his father leading a horse in soothing circles, keeping the animal moving, encouraging it with quiet words or a calming tune. It was the only time he ever heard his father sing. Turning away from others, he propped the child upright on his chest, so that her little face was under his chin. She was so tiny - his great hands engulfed her whole body. Because he had not donned his formal dress shirt, she lay against the softer, thinner flannel of his pajama shirt and he was much more conscious of both the warmth of her as well as the beating of her heart and the flailing of her small limbs. He moved automatically into the corridor where there was little light and quiet prevailed, and he began to walk, having the wherewithal to head away from the direction of His Lordship's room.

Miss Mary Crawley did not go quietly. She struggled against him as vigorously as she had against her mother. There was a renewed burst of yowling and she butted his chest with her head, indicating that she was no so easily pacified. But he did not give her the satisfaction of responding with agitation. Instead, he began softly to sing.

" _As I was out walking one morning in spring, I spied a young maiden..._ "

Though he knew a legion of songs, this one sprang naturally from his lips. It was one of his mother's favourites and it had always warmed his heart to hear it. In his dance hall days, Charlie Grigg had almost ruined it for him with a bawdy version that he had to work to suppress even now. As the sweeter words tripped from his tongue, it occurred to him that his mother - dead some twelve years now - would be smiling down on him, crooning this old tune to a babe in his arms. She'd have been sad that he would never have children - sad, not disappointed, for she'd never been that when it came to him. His mind filled with a picture of her cradling this little dark-haired girl, and he smiled around his song.

And as he walked the circuit of the gallery, his voice and stride and the vibrations in his chest aligning in a soothing rhythm, Miss Mary's cries gradually subsided and the tension in her small body began to ease. She did not favour him with the miracle of her wide-eyed stare, as she had the last time he had held her. She was far too tired to do so. But he was even more aware of the delicate perfection of this scrap of humanity. Had _he_ really ever been this small?

He was loathe to give her up when it came to it. No one had ever spoken to him of the mystical power of a baby - of the miracle of those perfect features and appendages, the power of those diminutive lungs, the incomparable warmth of such a tiny body. The endless crying took a toll, but oh, was it not worth it?

Nanny waited at the nursery door as he came around again. For a moment he thought the Viscount and Viscountess might have gone back to bed, but then he heard them within. Glancing into the room, he saw Robert Crawley kneeling by his wife's side, holding her hands in his, speaking to her in a comforting voice. And someone had put out a few of the candles so there was only a soft light flickering now. Nanny held out her arms to take the baby, but Charles thought better of it. Instead he held the now sleeping little girl out to her mother and Lady Cora, looking much more tranquil, eagerly reached for the child. She took baby Mary gently, held her closely, and pressed a few tender kisses to the child's downy cheek. And then Lady Cora gave Charles one of her own radiant smiles.

"Thank you so much, Charles," she whispered. In her voice he heard her relief, felt the dissipation of the wretchedness that had gripped her earlier.

A little embarrassed by the whole episode, Charles only nodded and withdrew from the room. Robert followed him.

"You've a magic touch," Robert said, his voice its normal timbre again, his lined countenance now smoothed over once more.

Charles shook his head. He did not want to take any credit. "A different touch, another voice, I think, my lord," he said modestly. "Or perhaps she simply cried herself out."

"A calm presence, _I_ think," Robert said. He ran a hand through his hair, his gesture an unconscious reflection of this habit of his father's when agitated, and glanced back at his wife, now the picture of maternal bliss in the lamplight. "I'm very grateful for your intervention, Charles. But my father had no business dragging you from your bed in the middle of the night. I'm very sorry for his presumption."

"I was pleased to be of service," Charles said diplomatically. "And His Lordship was concerned for you all, my lord."

This elicited a derisive snort from the Viscount. "His _concern_ only exacerbates the problem," he muttered. The slip was one he could make only in exhaustion and he quickly caught it. "Lady Cora was feeling the frustrations of a new mother. And," he admitted, "I was a little anxious myself. Thank you, Charles."

The footman took this as a dismissal and he was glad of it. He was tired, too, but he was also relieved to escape the generational tensions among the family. The Crawleys did not often quarrel among themselves, something that made working at Downton Abbey more pleasant than similar situations at other houses. His concern for the dissonance among the adults dissipated as he climbed the stairs to his room, his mind drifting in a different direction. He appreciated their gratitude, but it was superfluous. Screaming her lungs out or sleeping placidly, Miss Mary Crawley charmed him.

As he made his way down the corridor to his room, a door opened and Mr. Finch stepped out. His dressing gown was already securely tied. It seemed he had been waiting for Charles to appear.

"What was that about?" he inquired peremptorily.

Charles stopped and swayed a bit on his feet. He was feeling the lack of sleep now. "Miss Mary had a bout of colic. His Lordship thought I might be able to help get her to sleep." He had enough of his wits about him to realize how foolish that all sounded. The idea of His Lordship summoning a footman to soothe a cranky baby was quite ludicrous.

"And?" Mr. Finch asked. "Were you successful?"

"Well, I walked her a bit and she fell asleep. I think it was more exhaustion than anything else," he added.

Mr. Finch stared at him for a minute. "Do not deny your skills or talents, Charles. Calming a crying child is not, perhaps, one of the essential qualifications of a footman - or a butler," he added pointedly, "but it is a valuable life skill. And the way to any parent's heart is through a kindness shown to their child. Well done."

The butler gave praise sparingly, making it all the more welcome when he did bestow it and Charles was alert enough to be pleased by it. Mr. Finch was an incomparable teacher, knowledgeable in the ways of service and in life generally. He reviled boasting and vanity, but he dismissed false modesty as almost equally repugnant. Charles nodded in acknowledgment of the lesson imparted and the commendation.

"I hope you found a more appropriate song to sing the child to sleep this time," Mr. Finch said suddenly.

"Beg pardon, Mr. Finch?" Charles did not follow the older man's thoughts.

Mr. Finch, who so rarely smiled, smiled. "In the library last week, you were humming 'Two Little Black Eyes.' You're in danger of betraying your dance hall past, Charles. If you're going to make a habit of comforting Miss Mary, you might want to learn some lullabies instead."


	4. Chapter 4: The Heart Stirs Again

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **Chapter 3 The Heart Stirs Again**

He was sitting in the butler's pantry, in the butler's chair, and feeling like an interloper.

 _It's been three months!_ Seven, really, if he was counting the period before Mr. Finch's death when he'd served in his place as a stop-gap measure. They'd known - Charles, Lord Grantham, and Mr. Finch himself - they'd all known that the butler was not long for this world. Dr. Clarkson, the man given responsibility for the newly-established Cottage Hospital in Downton village, was clear on that. Mr. Finch had an inoperable and aggressive brain tumour, which accounted for his sudden, severe headaches and the sometimes radical shifts in temperament he had begun to display. But despite Mr. Finch's protestations, His Lordship had rejected the idea of a formal retirement and replacement. Mr. Finch was _his_ man, he insisted almost every time he made his way up to the room in the attics where the butler lay, which was at least every other day, and would die as the butler of Downton Abbey, if only in name. It was a small favour on His Lordship's part and one that meant a great deal to Mr. Finch, even as he resisted it, and not something every employer would have offered.

Carson - as acting butler he had gained the recognition accorded in being addressed by his surname - had welcomed His Lordship's discretion in this matter. He knew by then, had known for a while, that His Lordship and Mr. Finch intended him for the position of butler one day, but this was too soon. He had expected to be first footman, or perhaps underbutler, for some years yet. Mr. Finch was only sixty-seven years old and a very fit man. But then the headaches had begun.

Even with the extensive training he had received and the expectation of assuming one day the post of butler of Downton Abbey, Carson would have understood if His Lordship had sought another man, an older and more experienced man, to succeed Mr. Finch. Charles Carson was only thirty-one years old and such an appointment was premature by almost all standards. But Lord Grantham never entertained an alternative. He waited until after Mr. Finch's funeral to make his decision explicit. _Immediately_ after the funeral. They had only just turned from the grave and Carson, steeped in his own grief for the man who had played so substantial a role in shaping his career, had almost missed His Lordship's discreet signal. They walked together, away from the Dowager and Her Ladyship, both of whom had come to pay their respects, and from the staff, the entire complement of downstairs having been in attendance as well.

His Lordship was never one to dissemble. "You are the butler of Downton Abbey now, Carson. It's come upon us sooner than either of us expected. But there it is. I will make a formal announcement of it to the staff tonight." He waited only for Carson's inadequate acknowledgment in the form of a slightly stunned, "Yes, my lord," and then moved off to join his wife and mother.

Carson had frozen on the spot for a long moment, juggling his still-raw grief with the immediate and immense responsibility that had just been conveyed to him. And then, instinctively, he reached out to that source of support on which he had relied all his life - his parents. They were not far away. He had only to navigate his way around a number of tombstones to find them, his mother peacefully laid to rest fourteen years earlier, the still rough surface of his father's grave evidence of a more recent interment. It had been a bad year.

The Carsons were known for their longevity. Carson's grandparents, on his father's side, were in their mid-eighties when they passed. Family lore supported the assertion that this was not an anomaly. But Frank Carson was just sixty, the victim first of a cruel prank of nature and then a workplace accident, avoidable but for the demands of pride. It made his even-tempered son angry even now to think of it. The senior Carson's almost bottomless reservoir of patience, never so much in display as among his beloved horses, had dissipated rapidly with the advent of the palsy that had come on him almost fifteen years earlier than it had struck his own father. Forced to relinquish formal responsibility for the stables, he had maintained a presence there that had benefited neither himself nor his successor, an able enough man but one whose stodgy ways aggravated the displaced senior groom. Pus in the foot was a straightforward malady, a bit tricky to excavate, but not life-threatening to the animal. Sears would have found the problem eventually, but Frank Carson seized the hoof knife from him and went at the horn of the hoof with a vengeance. And then the knife slipped in the unsteady hand and the blade slid into his thigh and nicked the femoral artery. The new groomsman had panicked, there was a delay in sending for the doctor, and the wound was so awkwardly placed so as to impede the effective application of pressure. Frank Carson had quickly bled out. His son, urgently summoned from the house, had arrived in time to see him breathe his last, but just. *****

He stood staring down at their graves for a long time, long after the other mourners had left the church yard. They couldn't help him now, his parents. They'd already done all they could for him. He could only apply the lessons they had imparted. He came to them out of habit, comforted more by the thought of them than anything else. The fact was, this was something he had to face alone.

The butler's job was a lonely one. Mr. Finch had told him this on more than one occasion, seeking neither pity, nor as a deterrent. He was just stating a fact. "You're not upstairs or downstairs," he'd said emphatically. "You cannot be friends with people you must direct and discipline. It compromises your judgment. And don't look upstairs either. The relationship between His Lordship and his butler is unique, and can and does involve a close association. In the best of circumstances, it is a relationship of deep-seated trust. But you will not be friends."

It was precisely what Carson had sought. He wanted no emotional attachments. There would be his father, as long as he had him - which was not long, as it turned out - but he'd had his fill of friendship and romance in his sojourn on the halls, when he'd invested deeply in them and been betrayed by both. When he returned to Downton, he had not deliberately rejected the camaraderie of the other footmen as he had proceeded through the ranks, but he hadn't gotten particularly close to any of them either, becoming warier still as he discerned the path laid out for him by His Lordship and Mr. Finch. One of the greatest attractions of service was, for him, the discouragement of associations with female staff members. Such entanglements usually led to complications downstairs and inconveniences upstairs and so were severely frowned upon.

His appointment as butler of Downton Abbey had shown him, in short order, how true Mr. Finch's assessment was.

There were senior staff members - His Lordship's valet Mr. Bevin, the housekeeper Mrs. Dakin, and the cook Mrs. Yardley - with whom he might have established some kind of social relationship, but circumstances impeded this. They were all older than him by a quarter of a century and not inclined to warm relations with young footmen. And then he had leaped from the junior position of first footman over their heads to the most senior post in service, and if he was not exactly in direct authority over Mrs. Yardley and Mrs. Dakin, it was still a little awkward. Of the three of them, Mrs. Yardley was the most congenial.

He was most comfortable in the functional aspects of the butler's duties - overseeing the family's meals, taking care of the wine, managing the house books, maintaining the most valuable pieces of silver and crystal. Relations with His Lordship were good and the man was patient, but it was as Mr. Finch had said. They could not be friends. And there was more to it still. Carson knew it was no reflection on him personally, but it was clear that His Lordship missed Mr. Finch. They had worked together for a quarter of a century and operated in an unspoken tandem. Carson could _do_ everything that Mr. Finch had done. It was only that he _was not_ Mr. Finch.

He was least comfortable in his most familiar milieu, with the footmen, and he didn't quite know why. Had he not served among them and at every level so that he might understand and appreciate their work? Was this experience not intended to smooth, rather than obstruct, his direction of them from the position of butler? But, no. Frictions existed. It was as though the years he had spent in apprenticing for this position had never happened.

Only this morning he had lost his patience with Jonathan, the most junior of the footmen, recently hired to bring the number back to six. _It wasn't a difficult job_ , Carson told himself. _Polishing silver_. There were, admittedly, some tricky pieces, but this was a fundamental component of the footman's work. He'd torn a strip off the fellow and told him to shape up, that there were plenty of other young men about who would be glad of an opportunity to work at Downton Abbey.

The young man was hardly out the door before he felt a wave of remorse and then heard Mr. Finch's voice, almost as if the man were leaning over his shoulder and speaking in his ear. _Teach, don't terrorize. Instruct, don't insult_. Not for the first time since his appointment did he realize that _knowing_ something intellectually, as he _knew_ every element of a butler's work, did not necessarily lead to action in accordance with that knowledge. And so he sat in the butler's chair in the lull of early afternoon feeling like a fraud.

"Mr. Carson?"

He looked up.

It was Jonathan again. There was a note of trepidation in the young man's voice and Carson bridled at it, more out of guilt than any justifiable cause.

"Well? What is it?" He didn't have all day to be playing guessing games.

"I don't know what to do, Mr. Carson," Jonathan said, still hovering just outside the door as if he dared not risk life or limb by venturing inside. When the butler raised an eyebrow at him in an expression of exasperation, he hastily added, "I think you'd better come."

Carson sighed. He might be young, this Jonathan from the village, but he _was_ a man. He'd made a fair impression at the interview, but if he was going to fall apart at the first reprimand, then he would be doomed to remain on the lowest rung of the ladder, or drop off altogether. But they wouldn't resolve that question today. In the meantime, all he could do was follow where the fellow led.

And that was to the servants' stairway, leading upward to the family floors and to the servants' quarter above. Here another sight aggravated the butler. A gaggle of servants stood at the bottom of the stairs. They were all junior sorts, other footmen and a few maids. He wondered irritably where they had found the time for any diversion and made a mental note to tell Mrs. Dakin to control her maids. _He_ would deal with the footmen himself. In the moment, however, his attention remained on Jonathan who stopped as he reached the group and pointed.

Carson's gaze followed the trajectory of this gesture and his irritation dissolved as surprise took over. There, halfway up the flight of stairs, sat a little dark-haired, dark-eyed girl. Her eyes were round with curiosity and she returned with interest the looks of the several adults standing there gawking at her. She had an alertness about her. Despite the novelty of her circumstances, she was not afraid, not cowed, only a little excited, perhaps, at her adventure.

When his eyes fell on her, Carson's heart gave a convulsive tug. "Miss Mary," he said, and the people before him parted that he might approach the child.

Her gaze shifted to him and she smiled. Here, at last, was a familiar face.

"I'll see to her, Mr. Carson."

Mrs. Dakin had been drawn by the agitation in the passageway and now stood at his side. She was a capable woman. She'd been employed as housekeeper Downton for a little longer than Carson's tenure as a footman and she ran a tight ship. If she was not especially warm, the young butler had never had cause to complain about her either. She did her job very well and that was all anyone could ask of her.

"No." He spoke more sharply than he had intended and she glanced at him with a questioning look in her eye. He cleared his throat, made a deliberate effort to relax his stern bearing, and then turned toward the maids and footmen who still congregated nearby. "Thank you, everyone," he said calmly. They began to disperse. He focused next on the housekeeper. "Thank you, Mrs Dakin. I'll manage this."

She stared at him for a moment, her expression giving away nothing of her thoughts about this, and then she silently retreated to her sitting room.

And then he returned his attention to the child. She had not moved from her perch on the stair. But when their eyes met again, she smiled at him, and he smiled back.

"Miss Mary," he said again.

She shifted a bit, rising a little that she might look beyond him. "Is this where you live, Mr. Carson?"

She didn't know them all downstairs. Indeed, she saw little of any of them. A scullery maid made up the fire in the nursery, but that was done while she slept. Occasionally a housemaid came to clean the room before nanny had her small charges - for Miss Mary had a sister, Miss Edith, who was little more than a year younger - packed off for their daily walk on the grounds of the estate. But she knew _him_. They'd had a few adventures together, although she would not have remembered those few - to his mind very special - occasions when she was just a babe and he had walked her colic away. But she'd tripped by him often enough in the Great Hall on her way in and out with the nanny or, more rarely, her parents and nanny, he holding the door for them all. He always smiled at her. Indeed, he was one of the few adults who _did_ smile at her, her grandparents coming over rather stern from a small child's perspective. She remembered his smile.

"No, I do not," he said, answering her question. He rested a foot on the first step and leaned down a little, that he might present a less formidable bearing. "I live at the top of the house," he went on, lowering his voice as if confiding in her. "In the attics. But I work down here. Would you like to see where?"

She nodded eagerly, her eyes shining brightly, and she got to her feet. He held out a hand to her and she immediately took it, skipping down the few steps and then jumping from the second last to the floor beside him. Immediately she looked up to see his reaction. His expression registered an astonishment at her achievement that would have been more appropriate to an Olympic feat. This delighted her.

Miss Mary Crawley was tall for her three years, but he was of such a great height that he had to bend a little to keep her hand in his.

"It's a regular beehive of activity down here," he said, leading her down the passage and speaking with an animation more reminiscent of his time on the halls than any voice he had used in his career at Downton. The effect was to transform the drab grey corridors and the several functional rooms off of them into mysterious venues. "In _here_ ," he said, pushing wide the door to the boot room, where the two most junior footmen were hard at work, "Terrence and Jonathan are cleaning all the boots and shoes of the mud from yesterday's rain. _There_ are His Lordship's riding boots." He pointed and she stared with fascination.

"Over _here_ , is Mrs. Dakin's sitting room." He nudged the door open just a little as he said this and Mrs. Dakin, who had returned to her desk after his rebuff, turned a little in her chair on hearing his voice at her door. She was always polite to him in a formal sort of way, an acknowledgment of his rank, but without warmth. He had discreetly avoided drawing the superiority of his position with regard to her to anyone's attention.

"Erm...Mrs. Dakin is _quite_ a busy woman," he told the child. "Best we leave her to get on with her work." And he ushered her on.

Next he guided her across the passage and through the door to his own office. " _This_ is where I work!" he declared, with a dignified air that would not have been out of place announcing guests to dinner at Buckingham Palace. "It is the butler's pantry."

Miss Mary did not fail to be impressed. Her eyes wide with excitement, she stared about the room. "You have two doors!" she cried.

"I do."

"And two chairs!" Uninhibited, she let go of his hand and ran to the desk, climbing into his chair. She had to kneel in it in order to see over the desk. He quickly moved to her side and pushed the chair in that she might reach the items before her. She had to stand up to do so and he held the chair steady. She examined each object in turn. "What's this?" she asked.

"A fountain pen."

"What's this?" she said, reaching for the letter opener.

He swiftly swept it up before her small hand could close on it. "A letter opener," he said. "And it's very sharp. You must _never_ touch it."

For a moment she looked as though she might challenge this, her lower lip jutting out. But when he smiled at her, she smiled again and rturned her attention to the desk once more. "What's this?" she demanded as, behind her, he put the letter opener onto a high shelf.

"The wine ledger," he replied. He drew it a little toward them - she could not budge the great heavy book - and opened it to a blank page, at the same time offering her the fountain pen. She eagerly scribbled across the page, cooing with delight. Then she put down the pen and turned the pages back.

"What's this?" she said again, and this time pointed to a long list of wines and their accompanying columns of year, when received, cost, numbers ordered and received.

"In the wine ledger," he said, pointing to a line of script, "I keep track of all the bottles of wine in His Lordship's wine cellar."

"What's that?" she asked, frowning at the unfamiliar words.

"It's a cool, dark room below this floor -," he pointed downwards, "...where we keep all the wines in long racks, to make sure they stay fresh, or to store them until they're ready to drink."

She was less interested in what was in the cellar than the cellar itself. Staring up at him with an appealing expression, she said, "Can I go there?"

He was delighted with her inquisitiveness. "Another day, perhaps." Immediately her tiny brow furrowed in disappointment at his first denial of her wishes. "I promise," he said solemnly, meeting her fierce little gaze directly.

She seemed, he thought - or hoped - almost as entranced by his eyes as he was by hers. He smiled again and once more she favoured him with a radiant look of her own.

"Right now, though," he went on, "we might get a biscuit in the kitchen and then go find nanny. I think she might be looking for you. What do you say?"

Whatever she might have thought of seeking out nanny, she was certainly enthusiastic about the more enthralling words of 'biscuit' and 'kitchen.' His invitation prompted her to scramble down from the chair, without his assistance, although once on the ground again she reached out to take his hand before he'd even extended it to her. "What's the kitchen?" she asked.

"This way," he said, adopting his magical voice again. "I'll show you."

The kitchen was a world apart. Everywhere there were kitchen maids in a frenzy of activity - peeling and chopping vegetables for dinner, scouring pans, punching dough - and amidst it all Mrs. Yardley in full voice as she ordered them all about. To the uninitiated, it might have looked like chaos, but there was a complex if subtle organization to it all that owed everything to the able commander.

Mrs. Yardley was immediately aware of the intruders, her sensitivity to changes in the atmosphere of her kitchen being highly developed. Her eyes met the butler's, dropped down to take in his charge, and then came up to his again. Like the housekeeper, she was older than him by more than two decades and had observed his progress from the bottom of the table where he had sat as a junior footman to the head of the table as butler. She was more warmly disposed toward him, having known his parents well and having always found him to be the least boisterous of the young men about the servants' hall.

"How now, Mr. Carson? Have you got us a new girl to do the washing up?"

He gave her an appreciative smile as she crossed the kitchen toward them, wiping her hands on her apron as she did so.

"We're taking the tour," he told her, "and I think Miss Mary is in need of a fortifying snack before I take her back upstairs to nanny."

Mrs. Yardley rolled her eyes as though she disagreed with him, but put her hands on the biscuit tin in short order. She might have set eyes on the child only once or twice before. A cook rarely set foot out of the kitchen, except to retire to her room in the attics at night, and saw little to nothing of the family except for Her Ladyship when they consulted on the menus. Unless the children of the house came to her, they were great unknowns. But children did find their way downstairs sometimes and Mrs. Yardley had been at Downton long enough to remember a tousle-headed boy with bright eyes and a very cheerful disposition who had enjoyed a biscuit or two, and other delicacies, too, in his time, and who sometimes sought refuge below stairs when things upstairs became too trying for him. She saw in the little face upturned toward her now some shades of that sweet lad. "Here you are, then," she said crisply but not unkindly, extending the tin to the child.

Miss Mary made a careful choice and then looked up into the cook's indulgent countenance. "Thank you very much," she said.

"Mrs. Yardley," Carson supplied.

The little girl's eyes twinkled at him and then she turned to the cook once more. "Thank you very much, Mrs. Yardley." ******

Mrs. Yardley was pleased with the child's manners, but much more amused by the butler's reaction. He stood there beaming at the little girl as though her performance reflected directly upon him. The cook wondered at the ease with which the child had so completely captivated this always polite but often distant young man. She'd not seen this side of him before.

"You'd best get her back where she came from, Mr. Carson. Nanny will be out of her mind with worry."

The cook's words startled him from his reverie. He came over a little resigned. Yes, she was right, of course. A child of three ought not to have slipped nanny's care to begin with. No doubt the woman was frantic if, in fact, he thought just a little unkindly, she had even noticed she was gone at all.

"Indeed."

So he took Miss Mary's free hand and led her down the corridor once more.

"Is it a good biscuit?" he asked, watching her nibble on it in a more refined manner than the hallboys went about their dinners.

She rolled her eyes and patted her tummy. "It is delicious, Mr. Carson!"

He was entranced.

"What's this?" she asked, pausing on their route to point to a bucket hanging from a hook on the wall.

"It's a bucket of sand," he said promptly, and when she craned her neck in a futile effort to see for herself, he stooped and picked her up that she might get a clear view.

"What's it for?" she demanded, turning in his arms to look into his eyes.

He had held her before and looked into her eyes, but that was almost three years ago when she was an infant a few months old. How much more alert, and how even much more mesmerizing she was! He set her back on her feet before he responded.

"It's in case of a fire," he explained. "Throwing sand on a fire smothers the flames and so puts them out." She nodded in satisfaction and he turned to lead her back to the stairs only to find Mrs. Dakin impeding his path.

"That's hardly the thing to be telling a child, Mr. Carson," she said, with a frown on her face and a tone of disapproval in her voice. "She'll be having nightmares."

He glanced swiftly at the child, but she had finished her biscuit and was now rubbing her hands, trying to get rid of the sticky residue of her treat. Instinctively he pulled the crisp handkerchief from his breast pocket and handed it to her. His attention returned to the housekeeper.

"Miss Mary asked me a question, Mrs. Dakin. I was only answering it." He could not quell entirely a note of defensiveness in his own voice.

"You don't need to explain as fully to a child as you would to an adult," she responded sharply.

"I believe in the truth," he said carefully.

"She won't understand."

He thought for a moment. "She will eventually. If you will excuse us." He reached for the child's shoulder, intending to re-direct her toward the stairs. Instead, he found her warm hand slipping into his again. "Let's go upstairs, shall we?" he said, catching her eye. She nodded obligingly.

When he returned from delivering Miss Mary to the nursery, where he persuaded a somewhat distraught nanny that the child had been under appropriate supervision, if not her own, and assured her that no harm had been done, he found his mood considerably brighter than it had been all day. Striding by the boot room he saw the two young footmen still hard at work and he came up abruptly and looked in on them.

"Jonathan, a moment, please."

He stepped into his pantry and waited for the young man to join him. Jonathan moved into the room with caution, his attitude understandable given that this was the third direct interaction he had had with the butler in the space of only a few hours, and that the previous two had been unsatisfactory. He clearly anticipated a further rebuke.

Carson chose to address the lad from a standing position, rather than taking the butler's chair, which would have given him a relational advantage. The dynamic was important.

"Jonathan, I apologize for the curt manner of my reprimand this morning," he said, speaking formally but quietly. "You made a mistake. You must take care not to repeat it again. But I should have made arrangements to show you the proper way to do your work, rather than calling you out for it so harshly. Come back here when you've done with the boots and bring some of the pieces and your cleaning materials with you and I will show you how to manage it."

The look on the young man's face shot from alarm to relief to gratitude. "Thank you, Mr. Carson! I will get it right, I promise. It'll never happen again."

Carson waved off the fellow's effusiveness. "That's it then," he said, turning away. Behind him Jonathan bolted.

As he took his chair, Carson reflected on the fact that Mr. Finch might not have approved of that. Mr. Finch's world had been one of strict hierarchy wherein an acknowledgment of error might be construed as an admission of weakness. But individuals other than Mr. Finch had exercised a formative influence on his thoughts and behaviour, and in this instance he believed advice his mother had given him to have more relevance. _You should always apologize when you're in the wrong_ , she had said, _and no other consideration ought to come into it_. He had been in the wrong in the way he had dealt with the footman and that was that. If his acknowledgment of this error was interpreted as a weakness in the servants' hall, then he would address that problem when it emerged. In the meantime, it made him feel better to have righted relations with his subordinate.

It did not occur to him as he turned his attention to the wine ledger, smiling in passing at the childish scrawls that now defaced a few of its pages, that he had taken an inaugural step in forging his own approach to the butler's governorship of affairs below stairs. He had admired the austere manners of his predecessor and saw much in Mr. Finch's method that he might emulate. But he would chart his own path. Nor did it occur to him that the tender touch of a child might have helped free him to do so.

 ***A/N1.** I am neither a veterinarian nor any sort of practitioner with responsibility for human health. The veterinary details I have drawn from James Herriot, the famous Yorkshire veterinarian-turned author renowned for _All Creatures Great and Small_. In the matter of Frank Carson's injury, I consulted an R.N., Google having failed me. I'm hoping the details are both specific enough in what is said to be convincing and vague enough to get away with it if they aren't.

 ****A/N2.** I am well acquainted with a two and a half year old girl, not my own, who is at least this articulate, so I hope my characterization of Mary here will strike most as realistic.


	5. Chapter 5: Good Company

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **DISCLAIMER:** I do not own, nor do I profit in any way from the use of, the characters, settings, implied plot lines, or any ideas drawn from _Downton Abbey_. These belong to Julian Fellowes.

 **Chapter 4 Good Company**

Mr. Carson had spent the better part of the afternoon on the accounts and he was tired of them. He pulled his watch from his pocket and was relieved to see that it was almost tea time. He'd taken to having it in his pantry. Alone. Mr. Finch had done so for years, but initially Carson had chosen otherwise, thinking it useful to spend this time with the staff. Now, after two years of it, he'd decided Mr. Finch's choice was the better one.

Two weeks ago, after breakfast, he decided he'd had enough. He went to Mrs. Yardley, not immediately, not wanting her to connect the dots, and asked if it were possible that he have tea served in his pantry instead of joining the others every afternoon. He'd pleaded work, although she told him that he needed respite as much as anyone else, perhaps more. But she was agreeable. If she guessed his real reason, she said nothing of it. That was how they were, always polite and accepting of the official statement which allowed them to bypass points of potential conflict.

He knew his responsibilities as butler and he accepted them. It was necessary to be available and approachable, and he worked diligently at making that so. As butler he presided over three meals a day and, two years on, his authority was unquestioned. In truth, his authority had never been questioned, but it rested easily on them all now. Whenever he entered the servants' hall, chairs scraped and everyone stood as a matter of course.

It wasn't any failing in procedure or an issue with any individual that had put him off. It was his isolation. Mr. Finch had given him fair warning and he had gone into it with his eyes open. He had wanted the position, sought it, worked very hard to get it, and been successful. And he knew what it meant. But he was lonely all the same. Lonely in a way that he had not anticipated, in a way that even Mr. Finch had not forewarned of.

He'd always had friends. As a boy he'd palled around with several boys in the village. He was good at sports, fair-minded, and not snobbish about his family's place on the estate. Some of those boys had gone on to work on the estate in the fields or the trades. Others he saw in the village. It was not acceptable for him, not in his present position, to consort with any of them, but that wouldn't have stopped him, even if it meant courting His Lordship's disapprobation. No, it was that they had nothing in common any more. His old friends were all married, with children, and bills to pay, and labouring jobs that kept them hard at work and sent them to the local pub in their few off hours. He had no time either but, more to the point, they would have had nothing to say to each other.

Charlie Carson had been quite popular in his stint on the halls, despite his moral rigidity in the somewhat more relaxed world of the theatre. He was the more cheerful- as well as the more honest, reliable, and kind - of the "Cheerful Charlies," but he'd abandoned those friends with the heartbreak of Alice. He'd not seen any of them since.

For a while he'd gotten on with the footmen at Downton, been one of them, despite the trajectory that had marked him for advancement and set him apart. Even if his grammar school education separated them in some ways, there had always been the sports news to wrangle over. This kind of camaraderie could not persist once he'd become the butler, however.

But it wasn't so much _friends_ , he missed - he'd been steeled for that - as _conversation_. At the table, Mrs. Dakin sat to his right and Mr. Bevin to his left. Immediately next to them were Constance Meeks, the head housemaid, and Veronica Kent, Her Ladyship's lady's maid. Among the four of them, there was no good conversation to be had. While they were not unintelligent - although he had his suspicions in that regard with Miss Meeks - none of them had his education and all of them were so intellectually narrow. He respected Mrs. Dakin's professionalism and her work ethic, but her mind seldom reached beyond the limits of her duties and the boundaries of Downton village. Mr. Bevin was a good valet, but seemed inordinately concerned for the security of his job, as if it were His Lordship's practice to sack an employee as a sabbath ritual. His perpetual unease was irritating. The other two women were even duller. Beyond them were the footmen, with their talk of sports, but he could hardly be bellowing down the table all through a meal.

No one read books as he did. History was his favourite, but he liked novels, too, and he'd been granted access to Downton's library when he was still a senior footman. Apart from Mr. Finch, no one else had or wanted the privilege. No one read the papers or cared about politics as much as he did. "The business of the toffs," Mrs. Dakin had said. But that was hardly so. The Jameson Raid might have failed, but that business in the Transvaal was nowhere near over. Lord Salisbury's government was bristling over the French action in the Sudan. And other storms were brewing over Africa, what with the Germans and Italians now getting into the act as well. As butler Carson heard His Lordship and the Viscount going rounds on these issues and he longed to join in, but that would have been so inappropriate. Downstairs tedium reigned. His staff might be his (almost) equal in terms of their ability to do their jobs, but no one gave him any intellectual stimulation at all, and he missed this desperately.

So he would do his duty in terms of being present with them three meals a day and keep his door always open, and have one meal away where he could at least _think_ about the world beyond Downton for an hour.

He checked his watch again. Mrs. Yardley did her best, but not all kitchen maids were efficient. This is where he learned patience. And then a movement at the door caught his eye. Only it was not the errant maid with his tea, but a smaller form, half-in half-out, hugging the door frame.

"Miss Mary!" He was delighted. Here was a face to cheer his day.

At his welcome, she edged her way tentatively into the room, and then burst into tears and ran to him. Before he could stand, she had scrambled into his lap and into his arms, and pressed her damp face into his shirt front.

And at that slightly awkward moment, Mrs. Dakin looked in. "I was hoping to catch you before tea, Mr. Carson..." Her voice drifted off as she took in the scene before her. Mrs. Dakin had seen too much in her time to react to anything that fell into her view. "...but I see you've got your..arms...full." She paused. "I'll come back." And then she was gone.

Well, he didn't mind. Better her than anyone else. He gently detached the small arms that clung to him and looked into Miss Mary's tear-stained face.

"Now, then," he said kindly, "what's the matter here?"

The child thrust her hands up, palms forward, almost into his face. "I hurt my hands!"

He examined them. There were scrapes. "How did that happen?"

"Edith tripped me on our walk!"

"Ah." He knew that Nanny took them for a walk every afternoon, weather permitting. This looked like an injury sustained by sliding on a gravel path. "Did Nanny not tend to you?" he asked.

She nodded. "She put some...I-o-dine...on, but it still hurts!"

Yes, he had smelled the iodine. But clearly it was not enough for her. He had no medicine to trump Nanny's remedy, but something else stirred in the back of his mind. "I could, perhaps, kiss them and make them better," he suggested.

Her head went up and down emphatically.

And so he took her hands one at a time, gently kissed the wounds, then turned the hands over and kissed the back of them. "There," he said. "Feel better?"

She smiled through her diminishing tears. "Yes, Mr. Carson." She relaxed into him.

"And did anything precipitate this behaviour by Miss Edith?"

She twisted to look up at him, her face contorted in confusion. She had not understood his question.

"What happened before Miss Edith tripped you?" he said more simply.

Miss Mary was keen to tell the tale. " _She_ said Papa loved _her_ more than he loved _me_! So I pushed her and Nanny got angry with me. And then, when Nanny wasn't looking, _Edith_ tripped _me_!"

The parameters of the story were familiar to him, although the details varied. The sisters often quarreled. He nodded gravely. "A tragedy, indeed. But surely you know, Miss Mary, that your father loves you very much. He is father to both of you and must love each of his daughters the same." Carson had heard parents say as much and believed it intellectually, although he found it hard to imagine that _he_ could love another child as much as he did this little dark-haired girl. But that was irrelevant to this discussion. "You ought not to react to everything that is said to you," he suggested mildly. "There isn't enough time in the world and most of it is rubbish."

Whether or not she understood this advice, she seemed to have recovered, and so reached for his pen. He did not object. He had given her to believe she might use it. Obligingly he feathered the pages of the accounts ledger to find a blank page for her to write on. She wrote a row numbers, one through nine, and then copied them out a few times. He had taught her her numbers.

"Your tea, Mr. Carson." The kitchen maid had arrived at last. He had forgotten about her.

He cleared his throat and moved swiftly, directing her to lay it on the small side table, even as he eased himself out from under Miss Mary, leaving her in his chair. She was not in the least interested in the kitchen maid and continued with her work.

"Would you care to join me for tea, Miss Mary?" He made the offer in his most formal voice.

She looked up at him and her whole face glowed with her delight. "Yes, please, Mr. Carson!"

He turned then to the kitchen girl. "Could you please bring me an additional cup, saucer, and plate, and another slice of cake, please, Sarah?" He spoke almost as gently to her as he had earlier to Miss Mary. Mrs. Yardley had told him that some of the junior staff were intimidated by him. If that were the case, he had thought at the time, they must be _terrified_ of _her_.

She bobbed and dashed off to get the extra things. His attention returned to the little girl still sitting at his desk. He went to her side, offered her his arm, and led her to the small table with as much dignity as he might have shown to Her Ladyship. The chair was too low for her, although the table itself was not very high. This was something he would have to correct in the event that this happened again, which he hoped it would.

It was high tea as Miss Mary would have enjoyed it had she been permitted to join the adults in the library at Downton Abbey. As such, she had never experienced it before and was thrilled by it.

"Nanny always gives us egg and toast for tea," she told him, her eyes widening at the prospect of cake.

There was probably a reason for that, but he was not interested in it. Guests at his table ate finer things. He poured her tea, mostly milk with just enough tea in it to warm it up a bit. Then he offered her the sugar and she genteelly accepted two spoonfuls. He ate with enthusiasm and enjoyed her chatter. She had many things to say. Most of them involved her sister Edith and Nanny, neither of whom she liked very much.

"Grandpapa says I may begin riding lessons soon," she said with wide-eyed excitement.

"Do you like horses?" he asked.

"I love them!" she said emphatically, and told him that she had a polished black steed in the nursery who was all her own. Edith had a white horse, who was not nearly as handsome, and she seldom rode him anyway. Miss Edith preferred to play with her dolls. But Grandpapa had promised that Mary might ride a _real_ pony.

Carson thought this was, perhaps, one of the first times His Lordship might have spoken to the child. As skilled as he was in social situations involving adults, Lord Grantham had thus far evinced little interest in his grandchildren. Riding would be, for him, the first bridge.

Nanny was reading them a book about a little Swiss girl. "Her name is Heidi and she lives in a mountain hut with her grandfather," Mary told him. She frowned. "I don't think I should like to live in a hut with Grandpapa."

Carson did not tell her that her Grandpapa was an able man who could and would do almost anything, but living in a hut, with or without a small child, would never make that list.

Speaking of Nanny reminded him of something. "Does Nanny know where you are, Miss Mary?"

It should have occurred to him first thing, but he had been distracted by her tears. They had discussed this, all three of them. After giving Mr. Carson a piece of her mind about Miss Mary's inconsideration in vanishing to his pantry and his connivance at it in allowing her to stay - a reprimand which he had borne with more equanimity than he had felt, believing discretion at that moment a means to an end - she had relented, and grudgingly agreed that the child might come to him occasionally so long as she asked first. He knew that Nanny's reluctance stemmed in part from jurisdiction. All servants guarded their responsibilities carefully, lest they slip down the ladder to a junior post. But he also knew that Nanny found it easier to cope when Miss Mary and Miss Edith were apart, and that it gave her the opportunity to get a few of her organizational tasks done.

"Yes," she said.

He was glad. It had largely come to him to impress upon her the importance of asking and receiving permission.

"I told her I was coming to see you as I was running away after Edith tripped me."

Well. Almost all lessons required practice. But he _had_ only asked if Nanny knew where she was and in that she had been accurate.

"Where does tea come from, Mr. Carson?"

 _There_ was a perceptive question. "China and India," he responded promptly.

She was puzzled. "Chi-na and In-di-a," she repeated.

"They're foreign countries," he told her. "I'll get a book and next time you're here I'll show you where they are." It was the kind of promise that pleased them both.

When they had finished their tea, he escorted her back upstairs to the nursery. She might find her own way to him, but once there she was in his care and he was diligent about his responsibilities.

Back downstairs again, he went directly to Mrs. Dakin's sitting room. Tea was over and she was at work once more. Whatever her shortcomings as a conversationalist, the housekeeper was an indefatigable worker and he knew he could always depend upon her to pull her weight.

"You wanted to speak to me, Mrs. Dakin?"

She stood up when he entered the room, the conventional show of respect to the senior staff member. He had told her not to bother in her own office, but she continued to abide by protocol. He had let it go.

"I wanted to inform you that I've made a decision regarding the hiring of the new head housemaid."

He knew the background to this statement. Constance was leaving at the end of the month to take up a position closer to home. It was in a lesser house, but clearly other considerations were of more importance to her. Mrs. Dakin had conducted a thorough search for a replacement. He'd observed the process and complimented her on it, _and_ made notes for his own use.

He waited patiently for her to go on.

"I've decided on the foreigner," she said, almost as if she expected him to object. She did not have to be reviewing her decision with him at all. It was entirely a matter for her jurisdiction. But she was extending him the courtesy and he appreciated it.

"And you're not concerned about bringing someone in from outside?" It was always an element in hiring, although he had not thought much of the possible candidates from within Downton itself.

"I'm after the best person, Mr. Carson. This _is_ a head housemaid position, after all. There's a great deal of responsibility involved."

He knew that.

"This one is sharp, she can do every task and do them well, and she can manage people, which she'll need to do as head housemaid. She has potential, if only we can keep her busy enough here."

"Downton is a challenge for most of us in supervisory positions," he ventured. But her words caught his ear. "Are you planning a...change?" he asked delicately.

Mrs. Dakin laughed. "Not if I can help it, Mr. Carson, although...," she sobered a little, perhaps thinking of Mr. Finch, "we never know the time, do we?" She drew a breath and then brightened again. "We've a ways to go yet on that, I hope. But," she added, with a knowing look, "if Mr. Finch can raise a butler, then I suppose I can cultivate a housekeeper."

He hadn't known that she knew. He nodded in acknowledgment.

"And she's only twenty-seven, so she'll expect to spend a good few years as head housemaid here or anywhere before she gets an opportunity for advancement."

It wasn't everyone who secured the senior position at thirty-one as he had and he realized she was making a pointed reference to his precipitous ascent.

"And the successful candidate is?" he asked. She had brought it up so he was adhering to the contours of the conversation. Mrs. Dakin was responsible for the women employees and he would meet her soon enough. It wouldn't matter much to him who she was.

"The Scot," she told him. "Elsie Hughes."


	6. Chapter 6: With Interest

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **Chapter 5 With Interest**

Economy. His Lordship did not like to use the word because it suggested a crass concern for money more reflective of middle class sensibilities, but in two years' service as the butler of Downton Abbey Mr. Carson had a gained a proficiency in the unspoken language that governed the relationship between the master of the house and his butler, and understood His Lordship's meaning without an explicit statement. The estate was by no means in financial difficulty - the infusion of American capital at the critical moment as the decade began had seen to that - but the great depression had taken its toll and His Lordship wanted to advance with caution. And yet Mrs. Dakin was insistent on a more generous wage for the incoming head housemaid. It would be worth it in the long run to secure such a capable employee, the housekeeper had insisted. Mr. Carson was wary on financial grounds, but admitted to himself, if not to Mrs. Dakin, that if the new hire raised the intellectual level of conversation in the dining hall then it would certainly be worth it to _him_.

"Mr. Carson."

There was Miss Mary, standing in his doorway, her appearance in the early afternoon beginning to become a habit. He smiled at her, as he always did, but was a little puzzled by her dress, for she was wearing her hat and coat. If she were about to set out with either Nanny or her parents, she ought not to be down here. But he had heard nothing in her parents' conversation at the breakfast table to suggest a journey and Nanny usually took the children out before lunch.

"Miss Mary," he said, and beckoned her in. Sometimes she skipped in without waiting for his invitation, but in her more serious moments she waited for a more formal welcome. He watched her approach with some satisfaction. She was a bright, vivacious child who brightened his days with her sparkling countenance and lively, often mischievous, ways. But she could be dignified, too, as she was now, moving sedately into the room and climbing into the visitor's chair. Here she sat still, her hands folded in her lap.

"Are you going somewhere?" he asked.

She nodded gravely. "I'm running away, Mr. Carson."

He did not react, except to nod gravely in return. He did not know how to speak with children, so he spoke to her as he would anyone else. This was clearly going to be a serious conversation. He put down his pen and folded his own hands before him.

"Are you now."

She nodded again. "And I've come to ask you if I may have some silver to sell in the village."

He was impressed with her foresight. "That is a sound financial plan," he said. "Let us examine the possibilities." He stood up, took his keys off the hook, and led her to the cupboard wherein several of the more valuable pieces of silver were stored. He opened the doors and they stood for a long moment, considering the contents within.

"Silver is quite bulky," he said. "Have you got a bag?"

"No." She looked pained at her oversight. Then she looked up at him. "Can you give me a bag, Mr. Carson?"

"I might be able to find something," he said. He reached for a long-handled silver serving spoon and looked it over carefully. "They'll need to be polished up properly first. Tarnished silver doesn't bring nearly as much as when it's all clean and bright."

She understood the part about polishing. She had occasionally seen him doing just this.

He ran his thumb over the family crest emblazoned on the head of the spoon and then glanced at her. "That's the emblem of the Earl of Grantham," he said, showing it to her.

She knew this, too. Mr. Carson had explained the meaning of the different elements of the crest to her.

"It might be a little embarrassing to His Lordship if you were to sell some of his silver," he said slowly. "Someone purchasing it...well, you never know. They might make their own claim to being the Earl of Grantham."

This elicited a dramatic reaction. "But Grandpapa is the Earl of Grantham!" she cried indignantly, glaring at him as if he had asserted such a thing for himself.

He shrugged. "I know it," he conceded. "And you know it. But someone might _say_ otherwise, especially if he had the silver to back it up."

Such a thought had clearly not occurred to her. She frowned.

"Now," he said, " _I_ suggest we have a little chat about all this before you do anything drastic." He returned the spoon to its place and then held out a hand and she took it, allowing him to lead her back to her chair. He resumed his own seat and then considered her thoughtfully. "Why do you want to run away?"

She heaved a great sigh. "Every day Nanny takes us for a walk in the park."

He nodded, aware of this daily ritual.

"But...," she clasped her hands before her and levelled an appealing look at him, "I want to run about, Mr. Carson! And Nanny says we must walk quietly like little ladies."

That was, he believed, a valid complaint, and he was about to address it when she went on. "And when Edith and I are playing with our dolls, she can never make them do what she wants. I just _tell_ them and they behave for me. It makes me so..." She did not have the words to express her feelings.

"Frustrated," he supplied obligingly.

"Frustrated!" she repeated, believing he knew what she meant.

"Anything else?" He did not know. Perhaps she had a catalogue of grievances.

The irritation that had gripped her with the remark about her sister faded to a wistfulness. "I wish I could see Mama and Papa more," she said.

Well. He understood that. "These are serious concerns," he said. "But why run away?"

At this, Miss Mary sat up quite straight. "Because then they will all miss me," she declared.

"I daresay they will," he agreed warmly. "And if they do, they all might change their ways?"

She nodded emphatically. Clearly this was what she was after.

"But if you're not here, how will you know?"

This took the wind out of her sails and she stared at him in confusion.

" _I_ think you might tackle your problems differently. Running away is seldom a sound option. I know. I've done it myself."

This seized her attention. He had thought it might.

" _You_ ran away?"

"I did. It was a long time ago and I was a bit older than you are now. But, yes, I ran away from my life, my world, at Downton."

She was staring at him now, mesmerized. "Where did you go?"

"Oh, I went to different towns and cities. Only I had no silver to sell. Eventually you'll run out, too. You can't carry enough for a lifetime. So I had to get a job."

"A job?" This was an unfamiliar concept to a child of the aristocracy.

"I had to do something to make money. So I sang and danced before crowds of people."

Miss Mary's face lit up. "What fun!"

He could admit his shadowy past to her. She did not judge him for it. She could only see the thing itself. "It is hard work when you have to do it every day," he said. "I don't mind hard work and I... _did_ have fun." That, too, was something he could not have readily admitted to anyone else. "But I missed my family. _And_ my friends. And Downton itself. And it wasn't always so very pleasant. So I came back." He would not revisit Alice even for Miss Mary Crawley. She did not need to know everything. And what he said was the truth, so far as it went. "And I've been happy here ever since."

He watched her carefully. She seemed to be considering things.

"And... _I_ should miss you very much if you were to run away," he said in a kindly voice.

"Will you?" She was perhaps a little surprised at this.

"Every minute of every day." He said this with all sincerity.

This evoked a pleased little laugh from her.

"I have an idea," he announced with an abrupt earnestness, and he leaned forward a little to give force to his words. "With your permission, I could speak with Nanny about your walks." Nanny would be unlikely to welcome his intervention, but he was willing to try it nonetheless.

"And Mama and Papa?"

He sighed. That was a trickier matter. They would almost certainly see it as overstepping the mark. "His Lordship and Her Ladyship...your Papa and Mama...love you very much, Miss Mary. I can assure you of that. You will, no doubt, see more of them as you grow. Sometimes there are things we simply must accept and that may be one of them. And, as for Miss Edith and her dolls, she must manage them the way she sees fit, even if you don't find it very satisfactory."

It was not clear to him that she found his response very satisfactory. A little frown creased her face and she appeared to be struggling with what he said, perhaps not really understanding it.

"When your other worries become too much for you, you may always visit _me_ ," he said, hoping this would be of some solace to her. "I shall always be here for you," he said.

This brought a smile to her face again.

"And, in the meantime, might I suggest that instead of taking His Lordship's silver to sell and running away, that _I_ give you a sixpence to spend in the village instead?" Did this constitute bribery? he wondered. Or was it just an incentive?

Her eyes went round at the prospect, but she did not lose her sense of gravity. "All right, Mr. Carson," she said with comic deliberation, "but you must charge me interest."

He was charmed. They had discussed the idea of interest when he had once explained his accounts ledger to her. It impressed him that she had remembered this technical detail.

"Of course."

"And you must write it down in the book," she added, pointing to the ledger before him.

Obligingly he drew the volume toward him and picked up his pen. "Debtor: Miss...Mary...Crawley." He wrote out the words as he spoke them. "Amount: 6 p. Date: September 12, 1896." He then pushed the ledger to the far side of the desk that she might see it and approve. Putting the pen down again, he fished in his pocket and drew out a sixpence, which he held up between thumb and forefinger for her to see.

Eagerly she slid off her chair and came around the desk to receive it. She plucked it from his hand and then held it up before her eyes. He watched, entranced. Then her eyes came up to his and she beckoned for him to lean down to her. He did as bidden. She reached up, put a hand on his chest, and kissed his cheek.

"Thank you, Mr. Carson."

It was the first time she had paid him such a compliment and now his face lit up with a delighted smile. Miss Mary only smiled more broadly herself, pleased by his reaction, and then her gaze dropped to the coin once more, her thoughts consumed with the possibilities it held for her in the village shops.

He recovered his bearings. "Mind you put that somewhere safe until you have the opportunity to spend it," he advised.

She nodded solemnly. "I will."

Her plans to run away forgotten, she happily accompanied him back upstairs to the nursery, chattering about how she would spend the sixpence. Once there, he took the opportunity to suggest politely to Nanny that small children ought, occasionally, to be allowed to behave as small children. She might have construed this intervention as something beyond his competence, but he had won some small degree of discretion with her for his judicious indulgence of the child, and she at least listened to him. Whether or not she would act on his advice was another matter, although he thought he might hear about it again from Miss Mary if she did not.

In his office once more, his attention returned to the accounts and his eyes fell on the entry in the ledger. At once he felt again the gentle touch of the child's lips on his cheek. What a simple gesture that was, and yet at the same time how profound. He was pleased that she had found it possible to confide her childish troubles in him. He doubted she would ever know how gratifying he found her trust in him.

With the kiss in mind, he took up his pen again and made an additional notation in the ledger, in the final column of their transaction: _Paid in full_.

 **DISCLAIMER:** I do not own, nor do I profit in any way from the use of, the characters, settings, implied plot lines, or ideas drawn from Downton Abbey. These all belong to Julian Fellowes.


	7. Chapter 7: The World Beyond

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **Chapter 6 The World Beyond**

They sat at his desk, one on either side of it, both of them bent over their work in silence.

He was often less busy in mid-afternoon and welcoming of a distracting visit from the little girl whose regular appearance had quickly become the highlight of his day. But occasionally he had work that could not be put off. Today it was writing a letter of reference for Simon, who was leaving in the morning. He was going to miss Simon. They'd come up together, as footmen, and had shared a room for almost a decade. The first footman knew his job and he was a source of support to the butler. But Carson understood why he was going. Their friendship had cooled slightly when Carson had vaulted over the other in the line of preferment, and though Simon knew the move was the result of His Lordship's interference rather than his friend's lobbying, he could not help but resent it. Carson's appointment as butler had finished them off. With so young a butler in place, Simon could never hope for advancement. He'd taken his time to find the right place and now he was going. Carson regretted the decision, but knew he would have done the same in similar circumstances. So he was writing Simon the very best letter he could.

Miss Mary had accepted that he could not always put aside his work for her. Perhaps she did not fully understand that he was an employee of the house, but she was already aware that adults had things to do that often took them away from children. At least Mr. Carson let her stay in his office while he worked and she was pleased just to spend time with him. He had set her to writing out her letters and a few simple words. She already knew her numbers. And she was proficient in her letters, too. But that wasn't enough, he'd told her. She must also have exemplary penmanship, and so she practiced. He'd bought her a notebook and a box of pencils, the latter more useful than his fountain pen in this instance, and she was hard at it. The chair was too low for her, and so she knelt on a pillow that gave her enough height to work comfortably at the desk. He'd broached the idea of having one of the estate workmen build her a more appropriately-sized chair, but she had rejected the idea.

"I won't always be small, Mr. Carson," she'd said solemnly. "It would just be waste."

He had yielded to her wise words.

He wrote the letter carefully, but kept an eye on the clock all the same. They would have tea when he was done and he had a present for her. He was looking forward to her reaction.

His concentration was broken by a knock on his half-open door and he looked up to see the new head housemaid standing there. Elsie Hughes. Miss Mary continued with her letters, unaffected by the disruption. If she reacted every time a servant wanted something from Mr. Carson, she would be in a continual state of high alert. She had already learned to ignore the staff.

"Elsie," he said, the name still unfamiliar on his tongue. He tried to sound congenial. "How may I help you?"

He had been making an effort to come over less intimidating. Mrs. Dakin had told him that the younger maids thought him formidable and Mrs. Yardley had already set him straight on the kitchen staff for the same reason. But he had the feeling, still only an impression, that he did not frighten Elsie Hughes in the least. He did not yet know if that were good or bad.

Her eyes flickered briefly in Miss Mary's direction. "I'm sorry to interrupt, Mr. Carson."

"Not at all."

"Mrs. Dakin is out."

"She's at the home farm."

"But I expect this may be within your jurisdiction in any case."

He raised his eyebrows in a silent query.

"I was in the drawing room just now, making sure that all was in readiness for this evening."

He nodded approvingly.

"And I noticed that two of the small panes of glass in the decorative window in the far corner, toward the front of the house, were broken."

Mr. Carson frowned. This was serious. And it _was_ his within his responsibilities. "And no one else had noticed this?" He spoke almost to himself, wondering how this was possible.

"They're in the top corner and they're obscured by the shutters."

She had an answer for everything. "How did you discover this?" It didn't really matter. The important thing was getting them fixed. But he was curious.

"I went over to look out the window," she said bluntly, "and I looked up."

He stared at her for a moment. "To look out the window," he repeated. The staff at Downton Abbey did not look out the windows. They were usually busy fulfilling their duties. Still, he was of two minds here. She _had_ made a discovery of some importance, after all.

"The estate is lovely. I wanted to see it from that perspective."

Well, she had no difficulty speaking up for herself, did she? He decided not to press the issue for the moment. "Thank you for bringing this to my attention," he said instead, and then added, surprising himself, "How are you getting on?"

"Very well, thank you, Mr. Carson," she replied smoothly, as though such a question from the butler were to be expected. "Downton Abbey is a well-ordered house. That makes it a pleasure to work here."

That was a compliment to him, although she did not say it outright. He appreciated that. "You came from Holmwood House, I believe. In Glasgow?"

"You are well informed," she noted, gazing at him with an appraising eye.

He was not used to this. "It is my business to be informed," he said, perhaps a little more curtly than he should have.

Her eyes shifted to Miss Mary again.

He stood up. "Miss Mary."

The child look up at him and smiled.

"Permit me to introduce you to our newest member of staff, Miss Mary." He gestured to the doorway and the little girl turned obligingly. "This is Miss Elsie Hughes. She is our new head housemaid. You may call her Elsie when you see her about the house." His gaze returned to the woman at the door. "Elsie, this is Miss Mary Crawley, the eldest daughter of the Viscount and Viscountess Grantham." He stopped there, not about to explain the child's presence in his pantry to her or anyone else.

"How do you do," Miss Mary said in a stately manner, and then glanced immediately to Mr. Carson for his approval. He gave her a warm smile.

"A pleasure to make your acquaintance," Elsie murmured, watching this silent transaction with curiosity. And with a nod to Mr. Carson, she withdrew.

He finished the letter and, coincidentally, the kitchen maid arrived almost at the moment with the tea. They anticipated him in the kitchen now, knowing that when Miss Mary visited Mr. Carson liked to lay on for her. It was a bit of a bother for them, but Mrs. Yardley was prepared to indulge him and the girl.

Miss Mary closed her copybook and put her pencil back in its box, arranging both neatly on his desk before joining him at the side table. He was a man of order and in his presence she emulated him, whatever she did elsewhere.

After he'd got her settled in her chair at the small table where they took their tea, she elevated by yet another pillow, he poured the tea - hers more milk than anything else - and offered her a slice of raisin cake. Her manners, he noted in passing, were exemplary. He marveled at them every time. And then he gave her the present.

It was an atlas. He had visited every bookshop in Thirsk and Ripon, and most of them in York before finding what he was after. This atlas, emphasizing the world from a British perspective - really, _was_ there any other valid approach? - encompassed regional Britain, the nation and Europe, the Empire, and the world, this last comprised of those parts of the globe that remained outside of direct British control. He realized that Miss Mary was very young, too young perhaps at five years of age really to appreciate such a tome, but books were lasting things and they had many years ahead of them yet.

He had been a curious child, wanting to know more about the world. His mother had cultivated this, reading to him often of faraway places and from accounts of explorers. He had liked tracing routes on maps, had enjoyed doing this with his mother. He hoped Miss Mary would find pleasure in doing the same with him.

He doubted such things would happen upstairs.

If the Viscount and Viscountess had a son, the boy would be packed off at the tender age of six to a boarding school where, whatever else might happen, he would be fitted for a life in the world. Daughters, however, were educated at home by governesses, usually German women, something Carson did not understand. Perhaps it was a reflection of Her Majesty's Germanophilia, which had not yet faded though Prince Albert was thirty-six years in his grave, God rest his soul. But governesses were, to Carson's mind, of limited utility. They taught French, manners, piano, and art. The child - this bright, precocious child who was alive with curiosity - would also be taught to read, of course, but like the educational program set for her, breadth would not be encouraged.

And yet she was a daughter of the aristocracy in a nation that commanded an empire that straddled the world. And if Lord Salisbury had his way, it looked fair to take control of all those parts of it that it did not already hold in thrall. It was important, to Carson at least, that Miss Mary should know where that world was.

As a girl she would exercise no direct responsibility in it and that was how it should be, given the vile state of much of the planet. But when he reflected on Miss Mary's future, he thought of Her Ladyship, Lady Violet. _She_ was an intelligent woman who did not disguise her considerable intellectual prowess very well. She _knew_ things and brought a wider context to the narrow world in which she existed. She was a source of sound advice and solid support to her husband, His Lordship, in consequence. There _was_ , Carson thought, flirting with revolution, more to women than a capacity for running a household or bearing children.

He pulled himself back from that brink. Education was not, could not, be for everyone, not that he objected to the principle of _rudimentary_ universal education. But what would a house or kitchen maid do with more than the basics?

And yet...

His mind drifted back to the new head housemaid and to the conversation at the breakfast table only yesterday morning.

Elsie Hughes was dark-haired and slim, and had sparkling blue eyes. Mr. Carson noticed none of this. But he was drawn by what she said, even if he wasn't quite sure what he thought of it.

She had announced at breakfast, in the middle of mundane conversations about the potential of a record crop in root vegetables on the home farm, and Mr. Bevin's weekly lament about _his_ job insecurity, that the subway in Glasgow was almost complete and that she would like to take a turn on it.

"The underground, you mean," Simon corrected her. "Like in London."

"No," she responded lightly. "In Glasgow, they're calling it the subway. And unlike London's, it's _all_ underground."

Mrs. Dakin looked aghast. "If there's anything worse than trains above ground, it's trains below," she intoned.

Mr. Carson was distracted. He wondered how Mrs. Dakin was going to cope with the imminent twentieth century, when it was plain that she had not yet accommodated herself to the nineteenth.

Elsie judiciously ignored the housekeeper's grumble. "I'd like to experience it," she said, her eyes glowing. "Imagine travelling underground." Her voice had none of that dreamy silliness of some young women. She spoke boldly, firm in her convictions.

"It's not for the likes of us, imagining things," Mrs. Dakin said flatly. "Best keep our minds on our work."

Mr. Carson saw Elsie's mouth twitch just a little, an indication of impatience, but she said nothing, which was only appropriate. He did not know what he thought of the underground - or _subway_ , as apparently they had it in _Glasgow_ \- but one word of her statement had caught his attention: _imagine_.

He had an imagination and he used to exercised it a lot more. There was some scope for it in his work at Downton, as in all performances, but the precision of service was a far cry from the wide-open world of the theatre. For a moment he felt a twinge, almost as though he missed it. But he shook that off. Instead he focused on _imagining_ barrelling along at speed beneath the crust of the earth.

"Are you not put off by the idea of tunnelling underground?" he asked, speaking to her directly for the first time about something other than work or Downton Abbey.

She cocked her head to one side. "Well, it's different than mining, which is quite dangerous work, what with the cave-ins and black lung and eye troubles..."

She seemed well informed. Indeed, she sounded almost socialist, dwelling on miners' issues like that. He would have to keep an eye out.

"...but the work's all done on the subway. When it's finished, it's just a new form of transportation.'

Which brought a whole new level of challenges, he thought.

"But where are they all going?" he asked. He could see Mrs. Dakin giving him a disapproving look. She probably wanted to get back to talking about potatoes and turnips.

"Work, mostly." Elsie Hughes was no more put off by Mrs. Dakin's discouraging body language than he was. "It's a more efficient way of getting around. It's faster than walking and cleaner than horses, and may be less hazardous than traversing the streets, what with the introduction of motor cars. And it means you can seek work farther afield from your home and maybe get a better job." She _had_ given it some thought. "And it may help liberate the working classes."

There was that dangerous socialism rearing its head again and yet he did not want the conversation to end.

"Is that a good thing?" he asked.

He was conflicted over it. Stability was grounded in planting roots and staying put, not always lifting your eyes to the horizon and to allegedly greener pastures. He knew about that from both sides, and it seemed to him that this faster, more efficient transportation would only encourage transiency.

He was also conflicted about Elsie Hughes. She sounded a bit of a revolutionary, and they didn't need any of that here. But she was clearly capable of thinking beyond the estate, beyond her immediate surroundings, and that was more refreshing than he could say. And she spoke about such things intelligently. He was glad of that. And though she did not appear cowed by either Mrs. Dakin or himself, she was not disrespectful. There was also the fact that Mrs. Dakin thought her a good worker and worth an extra few pence a week. He would reserve judgment.

Then the bells had started to ring and they'd risen from the table to begin their day.

His attention returned to Miss Mary, sitting at the table with him, enjoying her tea and revelling at the world now open to her in the pages of the atlas. She _was_ pleased by it. Her eyes roved over the pages as he turned them - the book was too big for her to hold.

He turned to the page that featured northern England and pointed to a blank spot on the map between Thirsk and Ripon. "Downton Abbey is right there," he said. Then he showed her all of England and where it sat in relation to Europe. He flipped the pages back to the beginning where there was a map of the whole world.

"That's India," he said. "And there's China."

"Where tea comes from!" she declared, a great smile forming on her lips.

He was so proud of her for remembering!

"But how does it get from there to England, Mr. Carson?"

What a brilliant question! "For many years it came on great sailing ships that took months," he said, and found an illustration of one on a page that depicted the Pacific Ocean. "But now there are steamers that get from India to England in a matter of weeks."

She didn't understand everything. He wasn't sure she grasped the concept of Downton as a place that could be represented on a map. But that didn't matter in the moment. She was only five years old, after all. But she did like the way he spoke to her, he could see that. He turned another page and showed her a map that had all the parts of the British Empire coloured in pink.

Outside the pantry, Mrs. Dakin and Elsie Hughes met for a word on the linen rotation, and the new housemaid's attention strayed to the conversation within that they could not help overhearing.

"This great territory is Australia and the smaller island New Zealand. Australia is a _continent_..."

"Mr. Carson enjoys tea with Miss Mary," Mrs. Dakin said, by way of explanation, answering the question that was clearly apparent in the younger woman's face.

"Does she spend much time down here?" That was a more circumspect way to approach the subject.

Mrs. Dakin shrugged. "As much as she can."

"An indulgence of an indulged child," Elsie mused, without thinking much about it, and then caught herself. "I beg pardon, Mrs. Dakin. I'm only surprised that the butler of such a great house has time for that."

The housekeeper's eyes strayed to the door of the pantry. "It's a lonely job, being the butler. It does him good to teach the child."


	8. Chapter 8: Riding Lessons

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **Chapter 7 Riding Lessons**

By convention, married women were permitted to take breakfast in bed. The Viscountess regularly took advantage of this, as an indulgence of rank. But Carson suspected it was one of the few ways available to her to avoid her mother-in-law. Although Downton Abbey was a large house, there was no house big enough to accommodate a mother-in-law and daughter-in-law, especially when so great a gulf separated them socially, intellectually, and culturally. Carson understood this, sympathizing, in this instance, as he rarely did, with the younger woman. Usually he stood resolutely with Her Ladyship, the Countess, a woman he had come to admire greatly.

Her Ladyship rarely exercised the privilege of eating breakfast in bed. Although she affected an air of wifely subordination, fooling neither her husband nor her son, nor, for that matter, anyone else, she played a robust role in the affairs of the estate and the village, debated matters earnestly if discreetly with her husband (and to a lesser extent with her son), and was avidly interested in developments well beyond the boundaries of Yorkshire. She read the paper assiduously, if discreetly, and was always well informed. This being the case, she did not like to miss breakfast in the dining room where much good conversation was usually to be had.

On those occasions when she was not present, His Lordship and the Viscount took the opportunity to discuss a laundry list of items they did not want to talk about in front of her. In doing so they relied, as they always did, on their butler's discretion. He stood by the sideboard, almost unmoving, unless they needed him. He heard everything and they knew it. But he said nothing, either to them or to anyone else, and they trusted in that.

"Robert, we must get the matter of the heir settled." His Lordship made this pronouncement without lifting his eyes from the interior pages of _The Times_.

The son, who might have expected a lead-up to this statement via pressing estate business or even a reference to the Royal Family, was startled by his father's bluntness. "It _is_ settled, Papa."

Now His Lordship's eyes shifted in his son's direction. "But you haven't had a son."

"No," Robert said firmly. "And I won't be having one either. I have three daughters. Reconcile yourself to the fact that Cousin James is the spare and that his son Patrick will eventually assume the title in his turn."

 _The Times_ fell flat on the table with His Lordship's hand and he turned his full attention to his son. "James is a brittle man who will run roughshod over the tenants. Next thing you know there will be demands for land reform as in Ireland and we'll be out on our ears."

Robert Crawley had a well-developed capacity for equanimity, a necessary virtue in a house ruled by a father inclined to benevolent tyranny and a mother committed to spirited resistance. "Papa, if James is running Downton, we'll both be dead and it won't matter much to either of us."

"Even in the grave, I will suffer the misfortunes of Downton," his father intoned.

"He's my age," Robert reminded him, taking another tack. "Perhaps I'll outlive him, and Patrick will inherit."

"Perhaps Patrick might marry Mary," His Lordship mused.

"What?"

The butler looked up sharply at His Lordship's words, as startled by them as Miss Mary's father had been.

"Patrick and Mary," His Lordship repeated. "As a girl cannot inherit a title, the least she might do is marry it back into the family."

"Papa, she is _five years old_. Patrick is six."

Carson was His Lordship's man, but in this instance he was on the Viscount's side. He knew the aristocracy did odd things such as pledge their children to one another in their cradles, but it did seem rather premature. He moved to the table to pour more coffee. His presence distracted His Lordship.

"It's a great day, Carson. My granddaughter is having her first riding lesson." He spoke as though this was a matter of intrinsic interest to the butler, and it was, both because of Carson's own family background in the management of Downton's stables and in the knowledge of His Lordship's particular enthusiasm for riding, although it would hardly have mattered to any other servant in the house.

"Indeed, my lord."

His Lordship appreciated his butler's attentiveness. "There have been Carsons in the stables for decades," he announced, although everyone present was aware of this. "You won't want to miss this. Why don't you come along? Say about ten?"

It was Carson's business to accommodate His Lordship's wishes, but he was acutely aware that they were speaking of the Viscount's child. His Lordship had drawn him into such family affairs before, and he felt uncomfortable presuming on the young father's preserve.

"I might be able to get away," he murmured noncommittally.

"See that you do," His Lordship said crisply. And then he moved on. "Lord Kitchener is certainly making a name for himself," he said, picking up _The Times_ again.

The conversation turned to Britain's military adventures in the Sudan. It was a safer subject between father and son, and one on which the Viscount had a superior knowledge.

Carson adjusted some of the tableware and retreated to his post by the sideboard. His Lordship's invitation sat uneasily with him and he took the opportunity, when the men rose from the table and went their separate ways, to approach the Viscount.

"My lord."

Robert waited for Carson to reach him. "Yes, Carson. What is it?" He might have been irritated, but there was no hint of it in his demeanor. The Viscount's manners were always exemplary.

Carson could be as subtle as the Viscount was polite. "I may find it difficult to slip away this morning."

Robert shook his head, discerning the butler's meaning. "You are more than welcome to attend Miss Mary's lesson this morning, Carson. I'm sure she would be pleased to have you there."

And Carson would be delighted to observe this milestone in the child's life, but not at the Viscount's expense. "I do not want to impose, my lord."

Robert nodded his thanks, and then added, "But I agree with His Lordship. I would have asked you myself if he had not pre-empted me."

Carson bowed his head. A relationship such as theirs was necessarily built on honesty and trust. He took the Viscount at his word and at the appointed hour, went to the stables. It required him to shift a little of his work, but it was no trouble to do so. He had not been to the stables in two years, not since his father had died there. Of course, he'd grown up in that milieu, spent his childhood among the horses and always pitched in when he was home from school. It wasn't what he'd wanted for himself, but he'd never disliked that world. Now, though, it was tinged with that last memory. But he did not like being so beholden to feelings. Better to go and face them, and perhaps replace them - or at least counter them - with other feelings connected to a little girl and to a happier event.

He was the first of the house party to reach the stables and extended a greeting to Mr. Hart, the head groom who had replaced his father, who was waiting there already.

Hart stared at him in a somewhat frosty manner. "I was unaware that the butler of the house marched attendance on riding lessons," he said, with just a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

Carson understood a little of the man's inhospitableness. The Carson name was one of some standing on the estate. Frank Carson had been known all around for his work with the horses, and stepping into those shoes would have been a challenge for any man. And although Carson had foresworn his father's vocation to take up a position in domestic service, there, too, the family name was one of significance. Everyone on the estate was aware of the appointment of the younger Carson to the post of butler at the Abbey well before he could have any realistic aspirations to the job. This spoke of His Lordship's regard, which was not something to be lightly dismissed. In their own circles, the Carsons were people of influence. But these were the facts of life and Carson thought Hart would do better to concentrate on carving out his own reputation than dwelling on the accomplishments of others.

"They don't, usually," he said evenly. "But I do."

That ended their conversation and they waited in silence for the Crawleys to appear.

When he heard them approach, Carson looked up with interest, delighted as he always was at an opportunity to see Miss Mary. It took him a moment to realize that the picture before him was not entirely correct.

Miss Mary was dressed in a riding habit, specially made for her, and riding boots so small Carson could easily imagine them to have been made by elves. She pranced down the path beside Nanny, who held her hand and appeared to be imparting a series of last-minute instructions. Beside them, somewhat removed, was the Viscount. Every once in a while he glanced over at the child, who made spirited responses to her nursemaid. Neither father nor daughter addressed each other.

When Miss Mary saw the butler, her expression came over with glee and she ran to him.

"Mr. Carson! Look at me!" She twirled on the spot.

Nanny looked somewhat disapproving of this display, but she was out of her element here, and after speaking with the Viscount disappeared back in the direction of the house.

"You look very sporting, Miss Mary," Carson said warmly. She glowed.

Carson's gaze circumspectly navigated the immediate area. His Lordship was nowhere in sight. He said nothing about it, but the Viscount noticed.

"He's not coming," he said flatly. "He didn't come for my first lesson either."

Carson remembered this. "But _you_ are here for Miss Mary, my lord."

Robert gave him a grateful smile. "And you," he said. He nodded to the groom and Hart disappeared into the stable. A moment later, he re-emerged, leading a black Shetland pony, the leather and brass of saddle and bridle highly polished.

Miss Mary ran to the pony's side and began stroking the sleek neck. "What's his name?" she demanded.

"Shadow, Miss," said Hart. He looked uncertainly from the child to the Viscount. It struck Carson that the man was not entirely comfortable with children. This would have been the first time Hart had to deal with a child and it was, possibly, a daunting occasion for him. Not everyone got on with children.

"Shadow!" She glanced excitedly toward her father and Carson. "He looks just the same as my horse in the nursery! _His_ name," she told the groom, "is Midnight." Miss Mary had no difficulty speaking with strange adults. Hart did not know how to respond.

"A sidesaddle," Carson noted, thinking perhaps that a little conversation might ease the situation.

"Yes," Robert mused. "Her Ladyship would have nothing else. I'm not sure it's safe."

"It is, if properly adjusted."

Robert glanced at the butler. "Then let's hope Hart is as competent as your father," he murmured.

"Isn't he handsome, Mr. Carson?" Miss Mary called out.

"He is _very_ handsome," he said obligingly.

While the child danced around the patient animal with enthusiasm, the three men stood about awkwardly. Carson understood Hart's unease. The man had been hired from outside Downton and thus was not as comfortable with the family as a member of staff who had a longer acquaintance would be. Not every lord was as amiable as Robert Crawley. Self-consciously the man mentally measured Miss Mary's leg length and made appropriate adjustments to the saddle.

"Right then," he said at last, his voice sounding artificially hearty. "Come along, Miss Mary, and we'll have you in the saddle."

She danced up to him. But as she did so, Carson noticed the Viscount twitching in agitation.

"Would you mind? Hart?" The Viscount had stepped forward. "Only Mr. Carson is here at my invitation because he held the pony's head at my first lesson. It's...a bit of a tradition."

The butler and the groom locked eyes for a moment, and then the latter yielded, if a little stiffly. "Of course, my lord," he said, possibly more genially than he felt.

Carson took the pony's reins. Miss Mary's dark eyes went round at the appearance of her favourite. She giggled.

He ought to have been more considerate of the groom. It was a byword of service that one did not tread lightly on another's territory. But where Miss Mary was involved, Carson was beginning to realize he was capable of bending the rules, even against his own better judgment. He smiled back at her. Watching her, he saw her gaze shift to her father, falter a little, and then turn quickly back to the horse, who she began to pet again.

He didn't know if it was the child's manner or the way Hart approached her with so much uncertainty that he hardly cultivated Carson's confidence in him, but he had a sudden impulse.

"Mr. Hart," Carson said abruptly, "I ... realize this may sound irregular, but perhaps His Lordship could assist Miss Mary. My lord?"

Robert Crawley had been hanging back. He knew the protocol with servants as well as any of them. They had their jobs and a good lord permitted them to get on with things. If questions or problems arose, then it was the responsibility of the senior staff - butler, housekeeper, head groom, head gardener, whatever the case might be - to address them. This wasn't a problem, of course, but any interference on his part might be construed as an imposition on the staff member involved. He did not want to put Hart out.

Carson had no such qualms. He knew that Miss Mary longed for more attention from her parents, and it seemed to him that her father wanted to give it to her but hadn't quite figured out how to do so. Here was an opportunity. He caught His Lordship's eye, gave him an encouraging nod, and smiled when the man moved almost eagerly to the child's side.

In another moment, Miss Mary was in the saddle and her father was adjusting the leather with more facility with those small straps than Carson had anticipated of him.

With a glowing smile that matched the one on his daughter's face, the Viscount stepped back. "Show her how to hold the reins, Carson," he said, not taking his eyes off the child and quickly forgetting that Hart was present at all.

Carson paused only long enough to draw the Viscount's attention. Then he held the reins out to him. "I believe you are more capable in that matter than I, my lord."

This time Robert Crawley did not hesitate to act. He took the reins from the butler and burst into enthusiastic instruction, threading the reins through the little girl's hands and telling her why it was important to hold them in just the right way.

Miss Mary listened, as she listened to Carson when he talked to her about place names in their atlas or told her stories about her family, struggling to understand things that were just a little beyond her, but relishing the attention and affection that framed the information. Carson knew that look in her eye, but recognized, too, that there was something special in the way she looked at her Papa.

It wasn't necessary for the Viscount to be here. Mr. Hart could have managed the thing and while it might not have been the most pleasant of lessons for the small child, there were many of those ahead of her in other aspects of life, and she would have gotten on anyway. But it _was_ important that Miss Mary's father _wanted_ to be here. Carson appreciated this. He had enjoyed his parents' attention in all the small joys and challenges of his childhood. He knew what it meant.

And he knew, too, that he had played his part. He withdrew quietly, content to let them enjoy this rare moment of togetherness. Behind him he heard their laughter - the high-pitched trilling of the excited child delighting in the presence of a much-loved parent and the lower, heartfelt chuckle of the father, liberated for once from the restraints that circumscribed so much of his life. Carson was happy for them both.


	9. Chapter 9:Growing Pains

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **Chapter 8 Growing Pains 1898**

 **Crisis**

It was the first formal dinner party the family was having since emerging from full mourning and the first that His Lordship and Her Ladyship would host in their capacity as the Earl and Countess of Grantham. It wasn't a large affair. Indeed, the only guests were Lord and Lady Merton, a somewhat older couple whose estate, Cavenham, was one of the largest in the county. Lord Merton, an old school chum of the late Earl, was Mary Crawley's godfather, and the Mertons had been frequent guests at Downton over the years. Lady Violet, now the Dowager Countess of Grantham, would also be in attendance. And in a rare departure from convention, the children were to be brought in briefly before dinner so that Lord Merton might see his goddaughter. It was his special request and, as an obliging host, Robert Crawley had acceded to it, though his mother threw her hands up in dismay at the deplorable effrontery of Lord Merton and this woeful lack of propriety on the part of her own son.

Carson wanted everything to be perfect. He always wanted everything to be perfect and in his five years as the butler of Downton Abbey he had established an enviable reputation for achieving just that. Perfection required a well-thought-out strategic plan, scrupulous attention to detail, and superb timing. He had everything very well in hand.

When, in the midst of the late-afternoon bustle, Miss Mary appeared at his pantry door, he was surprised to see her. She was one of the main attractions of the evening and he wondered how she had escaped Nanny on such an important occasion. But he was less concerned about this, in itself, than that he could not welcome her as he usually did. It wasn't the first time this had happened, so she understood when he explained. He always took the time to explain. She appreciated this, even though she was disappointed, too. And he reassured her that she could come back another time.

And she did, about ten minutes later. He almost tripped over her on his way to the wine cellar. He might have brushed by her with a kind but dismissive word, but his ever perceptive eye, a requirement of a butler, took in that she looked a bit rumpled and that her shoes were muddy. This was more than odd. The Crawley girls were not allowed beyond the nursery unless they looked their best.

"Miss Mary," he began cautiously, lingering by her side, "is there something the matter?"

She looked up at him with those expressive eyes and bit her lip.

He withdrew into his pantry and beckoned her to follow him. "What is it?" he asked gently.

It took her a moment to decide to speak, which he found just a little unsettling. She was a very forthright child. "It's Edith," she said at last.

"Go on," he said.

"She's stuck."

This did not bode well. "Stuck. Stuck where?" He kept his voice even.

She hesitated. "In the cowsheds."

"But there's no one in the cowsheds," he said. "The cows are out to pasture. What was Miss Edith doing there?"

Miss Mary only shrugged.

He did not believe her quite so innocent as she made out, but he let it go for the moment. Instead he took out his watch and calculated the time, and considered his options. He could delegate responsibility for looking into this to someone else, but she had come to him and he thought that meaningful. It was necessary to honour that.

"Right," he said, snapping the watch closed and pocketing it. "Let us go...un-stick her." It would be a close run thing. He needed to be upstairs, looking sharp, at the appointed hour. In the meantime, he was certain, Nanny must be frantic with two of her charges gone missing in action at this critical moment. It astonished him that she wasn't downstairs already, but then Miss Edith never came here, so perhaps she was searching elsewhere for the girls. He looked in at the servants' hall where the two most junior footmen were engaged in some last-minute polishing.

"Geoffrey." Geoffrey had once been a hall boy and was now the sixth footman. The lad leapt to his feet and almost dropped the bowl on which he was working.

"Mr. Carson."

"Please go find Nanny Lambert. She may or may not be in the nursery. Tell her that Miss Mary and Miss Edith are with me and that I shall return them to the nursery as soon as possible. She should wait for us there. I will explain then." Geoffrey nodded and ran. He was still a little awed by Mr.-Carson-the-butler, but he _was_ reliable.

They walked as quickly up the passage and out into the coal yard. When they reached the gravel path that led down to the cowsheds, he broke into a jog, with Miss Mary keeping up as best she could.

"How was it that Miss Edith came to be in the cowsheds?" he asked, lessening his stride that they might speak as they ran. It was an undignified pace for a butler in full livery, but he was worried even more about the little girl ahead of them than about the disruption to his schedule. The Crawley children were rarely, if ever, beyond direct supervision.

She said nothing.

"Miss Mary?" he prompted her.

She hazarded a glance his way and pasted a smile on her face, the like of which seldom failed to charm him. But he did not yield to it now. "We were playing a game," she said.

He waited for more.

"I dared her to go in," she added.

He passed over the opportunity to impugn the iniquitous practice of daring in order to get to the point. "And then what happened?"

"She got stuck in one of the stalls."

"And this just...happened?" There was no rancour in his voice. He was just trying to elicit information.

"I dropped the bolt," she admitted, not smiling any more.

"Locking her in."

"I tried to lift it again, Mr. Carson," she said quickly, defensively, her chin jutting out. "But I couldn't."

"And Miss Edith? How did she react to this?" He could well imagine. He did not see much of the Crawleys' middle daughter. But his glimpses of her in the nursery or the Grand Hall or on her walks with Nanny and her sisters, had revealed to him a pale, fine-boned little girl who seemed fragile in both physical make-up and spirit. She had large, sensitive eyes that easily filled with tears and an almost tremulous voice. Miss Edith did not press boundaries and so had never ventured downstairs as her older, bolder sister had done. Carson had the impression that the child would be vulnerable to the more forceful character of her sister and thought he might be seeing evidence of that today.

Miss Mary's shoulders shifted a little. "She started to cry," she stated flatly, and then added, with more exasperation than a seven-year-old ought to feel about anything, "Edith is a bit of a baby."

He said no more, preferring to wait until he understood the situation in full before dealing with Miss Mary. But he was not pleased and her sombre demeanour as she tripped along next to him suggested that she grasped this.

He could hear Miss Edith well before they reached the cowsheds and he broke into a run when her screaming reached his ears. Miss Mary was hard on his heels. It was dark in the cowsheds. And dirty. The estate employed a few young boys to keep them clean during the winter, but they hadn't done a stellar job of it when the cows had been turned out to pasture in the spring. He could feel the muck beneath his feet, soiling his highly polished shoes. Everything he touched left a residue on his hands.

And then there was Miss Edith.

She had obviously been scrambling around the stall, frantically seeking a way out, as well as sobbing and screaming in terror. She was filthy from head to foot, her dress torn, and one of her shoes lost in the churned up earthen floor. Though she knew him only in passing, if she even recognized him at all in her distress, she immediately saw him as her saviour and leapt into his arms as he bent to pick her up. And then she clung to him as though her life depended on it, and erupted in a renewed torrent of sobs.

"I'm sorry, Edith," Miss Mary piped up, reaching out to touch her sister's ankle, which was all that was within her grasp.

Miss Edith responded with a wail and by wrenching her foot out of her sister's hand.

Carson did not blame her. She had been locked in a dark place and abandoned there. She'd been exposed to more filth than she had ever seen and was covered in it. And her sister, who she had trustingly followed, been her tormenter. No wonder she clung to him. He would tell Nanny to give her a thorough going-over to ensure she did not contract lockjaw from the dirty stall. And, he thought grimly, feeling rather than seeing the grime with which he, too, was now encrusted, he would have a word with the cow man about the state of the sheds.

He ran back to the house, as awkward as it was with Miss Edith in his arms, with Miss Mary in his wake. He hadn't thought this out well, had not anticipated the soiling of his clothes, and hands, and shoes. Everything was filthy. It would not be enough to brush off his jacket and wash his hands. The whole of him required a good scrubbing and his clothes must be dispatched to the laundry. He had another livery, and clean shirts, too, but his shoes would take some work. And time. And time was what he did not have.

They came in through the coal yard door and he almost ran right over Elsie Hughes, the head housemaid, who was passing by with an armful of clean linens and who stopped short of collision with him.

"Mr. Carson! What's happened to you?"

She asked the question, but her sharp eyes travel from the squalling and dirty child in his arms to the somewhat ruffled but still fairly presentable child at his side, and then back to his face. He saw a knowing look there, and disapproval, too, but she said nothing of that.

"You'll be wanted upstairs shortly," she said, "but never in that condition."

"I know that," he snapped impatiently. That much was obvious.

To his surprise, she ignored his manner and quickly turned to put the linens on a nearby shelf. Then she faced him again with a cool steadiness that was quite unexpected. "I'll take Miss Edith," she said crisply, holding out her arms. Another six year old might have been too much for her, but Miss Edith was a slender child. She also cooperated, transferring her grip to the welcoming embrace of this calm woman. "You come with me, too," Elsie said, holding out a hand to Miss Mary. The tone of her voice left room for nothing but strict obedience and Miss Mary reluctantly accepted the direction, although she cast an appealing glance at the butler. He did not notice. The housemaid was not finished with him yet.

"You've got to get washed up and changed right away." Before he could advance a plan for that, she turned her head and called sharply, "Geoffrey! Peter! Stuart!"

The footmen came running from different directions. They were not accustomed to commands given in a woman's voice, although they did what Mrs. Dakin told them, and they looked uncertainly at Mr. Carson as they gathered in the passage. But it was the head housemaid who spoke.

"Geoffrey, take Mr. Carson's shoes and clean them up. You haven't got long. He'll need them in a few minutes. Stuart, go upstairs with Mr. Carson. While he's washing himself up, get out his spare livery and shirt and help him dress. Peter." The third footman stood taller under her commanding eye. "Get upstairs and make sure everything is in order in the dining room. Mr. Carson may not have time for his usual last-minute check."

Peter raced off. The other two hovered, waiting for Mr. Carson. He stood transfixed for a moment, more than a little shocked by this turn of events.

"Get on with you, Mr. Carson!" Elsie said impatiently. "You haven't got all day."

And he didn't. Her sharp manner broke the spell and as she turned away, taking the children God knew where, he hastily stepped out of his shoes. Geoffrey scooped them up and ran to the boot room. Then he stormed up the servants' stairs, with Stuart on his heels.

There was so much to do and so little time to do it in, that he was downstairs, starched and polished and attending to the guests before he realized that a housemaid - a head housemaid - had taken charge and ordered him about as though he were an errant schoolboy. If her manner was presumptuous, he had to admit nevertheless that she had managed the situation with admirable poise. He was grateful for her for taking on the children and organizing the footmen in the moment, his gratitude tempering a slight disgruntlement at the way she had bossed him about. He would have to find a moment to thank her for her presence of mind.

 **Consequences**

Despite the turmoil that preceded the event, the only disappointment of the evening was Lord Merton's, as he did not get to see his godchild after all. Nanny sent word, at the last minute, that the children were not up to it, and Lord and Lady Grantham, deferring to Nanny's judgment, delivered the news with equanimity, though they determined to investigate the reasons for it at the most convenient opportunity. The change in plans pleased Lady Merton, who detested all children but her own, and pacified the Dowager, who loved her granddaughters but believed they had no place in adult functions. The good cheer of these two women offset Lord Merton's slight regret. He was an easygoing man who took setbacks in stride.

Carson had managed, with the assistance of his footmen, to make himself presentable in time and so the evening unfolded without incident. But it was not the perfect evening he had envisaged because his mind kept wandering to Miss Mary and her sister. He was troubled by what had happened and by the growing conviction that he have to do something about it.

This determination brought him to the nursery the next morning at the first moment he could get away. He was relieved of the necessity of explaining himself to Nanny. Instead, she filled his ear with praise for the head housemaid who had delivered the children and made his excuses for him. He suspected that Elsie's helpfulness in getting Miss Edith calmed and both girls cleaned up, tasks that were quite outside her duties, went a long way to assuaging Nanny's disgruntlement. This made it easier for him to secure a few minutes now with Miss Mary.

Carson was certain that Miss Edith would have conveyed the whole story to Nanny, and likely to Elsie, too, and that appropriate disciplinary measures had been taken. But the incident was one that went beyond Miss Mary and her sister, and that was why he was here.

Miss Mary was pleased to see him but she had the wherewithal, perhaps prompted by Nanny, to appear chastened, too. He took her out on the gallery, deserted by the family at this house, that they might speak privately.

He was not angry with her, but he was deeply disappointed, an emotion he utterly reviled. And he was shocked, too, at her behaviour toward her sister. This might have been the result of his ignorance of sibling relationships. His only brother had died when they were both small children, so he had no experience of the dynamic. But whether or not he understood siblings, or children for that matter, he could not let this episode pass without reflection on the relationship between him and this child whom he loved so much.

"And how is Miss Edith this morning?" It wasn't the best place to start, but this was all new to him.

Miss Mary glanced toward the nursery door, slightly puzzled by his question. He had just seen Edith for himself. But she understood his intent all the same. "She cried all night," she said soberly.

"I'm not surprised," he said drily. Then he turned to his own concern. "I am...pleased...that you came to me yesterday," he said slowly. "You needed help to rescue Miss Edith and it was appropriate that you should come to me for that."

She twisted her head to look up at him, not quite sure of the direction he was taking. She was familiar with the sometimes formal tone he took with her. Usually it bolstered her confidence, for it was the same way he spoke to the adults around him. But she sensed the disapprobation her beneath his approving words.

"You should always feel that you may bring anything to my attention" he went on, maintaining an even tone. "But..." Their eyes met, each were taking the measure of the other. He spoke from his great height, not wanting to diminish the impact of his message by crouching down. "But...that does not mean that I approve of everything you do, or that I will refrain from correcting you when you are in the wrong."

She frowned a little and he realized he must speak more plainly.

"You treated your sister very badly yesterday," he said bluntly. "You tricked her, frightened her, and abandoned her. You put her into a situation where harm might have come to her and from which she might yet still suffer, from an illness or infection. These are boundaries you _must not cross_ with _anyone_ , least of all someone younger than yourself and more vulnerable in so many ways." He spoke quietly, but he could not quite keep the heat out of his words. Still he was impressed that she continued to meet his gaze. She had a core of steel, he thought, rather like her grandmother.

"Your...actions...had further repercussions," he went on. "The management of Downton Abbey is in my charge and the smooth conduct of your parents' affairs, such as the dinner last night for Lord and Lady Merton, is in my hands. That dinner was very nearly disrupted because I was attending to Miss Edith and that it did _not_ come to grief was because several members of staff went beyond what is required of them to make sure it did not. My assistance will _always_ be available to you, Miss Mary, but you must take heed _not_ to call upon it frivolously."

"And then there is Lord Merton. Your godfather wanted very much to see you yesterday and special arrangements had been made for that purpose. But all of that was thwarted by your mischief."

As he was speaking, her equanimity had begun to waver. Her lower lip trembled and though she tried very hard to contain herself - he could see the effort in the tenseness of her body - great tears filled her eyes and began to spill over onto her cheeks. The sight of this wrenched at his heart, but he remained steadfast. He could not yield to sentiment here.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Carson," she said, her voice more highly pitched than normal. She looked away for a moment and then her dark eyes, wet with sorrow and distress, turned up to his again. "I truly am."

He believed her and nodded solemnly in acknowledgment of this. "It's not enough to be sorry," he said firmly. "Actions have consequences, for you as well as those directly affected by them." Learning this had been one of the most valuable lessons of his life. "There is a price to pay."

 **The Upstairs Response**

The consequences of Miss Mary's deed extended further for Carson than hard words with the child, and in unanticipated ways. Every afternoon after tea, the three little Crawley girls were brought to the library for an hour of engagement with their parents. It was hardly surprising, and no one but Miss Mary could have begrudged her for it, that Miss Edith took the opportunity to regale her parents with the previous afternoon's events. Miss Edith rarely held the limelight, caught always between the dynamism of her older sister and the sweetness of toddler Sybil, and made the most of her moment.

Carson was not present for this. The staff usually were not as this was private family time. But he came in immediately after the children were gone up, summoned by Her Ladyship who wanted to know why he had not informed them of his role in the drama. There was a slight note of aggravation to her query.

Lord Grantham intervened on his butler's behalf. "This is not a matter of Carson's jurisdiction, my darling," he told his wife patiently. "As Nanny said, she soothed Edith and disciplined Mary, and that is all there is to it." It was not, in His Lordship's view, even really a matter for them, although he had listened attentively to Edith's account and supported his wife's rebuke of their eldest child.

"Robert!" Her Ladyship ignored Carson's presence in this expression of her indignation. " _We_ are the parents here." Then she looked to the butler again. They had a polite but distant relationship, Carson's close association with His Lordship's father and his discreet but still-apparent alliance with the Dowager only compounding Her Ladyship's natural unease with so foreign an entity as an English butler. "In future, Carson," she said, tempering her irritation, "I would appreciate a full account."

He nodded acquiescently. "My lady."

She left the room, but His Lordship lingered. Robert Crawley had experienced first-hand the childrearing practices with which his American wife still struggled and he had no objections to the way the matter had been dealt with. He also had a greater appreciation, again from a similar history, of the relationship that had developed between his eldest child and his butler.

"Have you spoken with Miss Mary about her behaviour?" he asked lightly, with the clear expectation that the butler had done so.

"I did, my lord," Carson responded. "I gave her a dressing down about it," he said frankly, "and told her she could not visit me for three weeks in consequence." Carson readily exercised the authority of his position when it came to matters involving the house and had a comfortable relationship with His Lordship that was growing stronger by the day. Although his association with Miss Mary was outside of the bounds of his usual responsibilities, he was not ill at ease in discussing the connection with the child's father.

"Hmm." Robert nodded approvingly. "Well. Well done."

Carson felt strongly about what Miss Mary had done and hoped to make an impression on her with his response, but these were new waters for him. "I wonder whether she will _want_ to come back," he said, a little uncertainly. He wasn't one for second guessing, but she was a spirited child and he wondered if he had been too harsh.

But His Lordship only smiled at this, remembering childhood scoldings from his favourites downstairs. "Oh, she will," he said airily. "I think you can count on it."

 **The Downstairs Analysis**

Afer the servants' supper that night, Elsie Hughes found Mrs. Yardley staring pensively down the passage at the closed door of the butler's pantry and the sliver of light that shone beneath it.

"Is something troubling you, Mrs. Yardley?" Elsie asked helpfully.

The cook shrugged. "Mr. Carson's been in a bit of a mood today, didn't you think?"

An image of the bedraggled butler, with one child in his arms and another at his side, filled Elsie's mind, and she nodded knowingly. "I think Mr. Carson has discovered that there's more to being a father than tea parties and telling stories," she said. "I expect he'll get over it."

They both laughed.


	10. Chapter 10: Nightmares

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **Chapter 9 Nightmares**

 **A Problem in the Nursery**

"I don't know why this is even a topic for conversation!"

The Dowager's declaration prompted a discreet exchange of glances between His Lordship and Her Ladyship that did not escape their butler's sharp eyes. He was making the rounds of the table with the claret as the discussion unfolded.

"Neither do I," His Lordship muttered darkly.

"This is why you _have_ nannies!" the Dowager went on. "You ought not to be concerned with the matter at all."

Carson suspected that Her Ladyship would like to tell her mother-in-law to mind her own business. But, of course, that wasn't done, possibly not even in America. And besides, the young woman looked too tired to form the words of a rebuke, let alone challenge the formidable former grand lady of Downton.

Instead His Lordship took on his mother. "The nannies have run out of options, Mama. And they're just plain exhausted by it. As we are. The mere presence of nannies does not prevent the sound of a screaming child from travelling the passage and keeping everyone on the gallery awake."

"Your father always said the nursery was too close to the bedrooms," the Dowager chided relentlessly. "It's all this attention that's keeping her going. If you'd all stop fussing over her and let her cry herself out, she'd soon stop."

Lady Violet spoke in an authoritative voice and in most circumstances Carson would have yielded to her prescription. But in this matter he did not. The issue was Miss Mary's nightmares, which had begun to plague her almost a month ago and which seemed to be intensifying. The child woke up screaming in terror at a volume fit to wake the dead in the churchyard and quite enough to set off the two younger sisters with whom she shared the nursery. As His Lordship had noted, no one on the gallery could sleep through that. It had been a topic of conversation between the agitated parents on several occasions. The butler and footmen were well aware of the problem, although their rooms in the attics kept them well insulated from Miss Mary's outbursts.

"We're beyond that, Mama," His Lordship said, almost irritably.

"Have you spoken to...oh, what's his name, the young man down at the hospital...?"

"Dr. Clarkson has examined her and he says there's nothing wrong, not physically." They were the first words, beyond "good evening," that Lady Grantham had spoken. Even these few words betrayed her exhaustion. She had been soothing one child or another in the middle of the night for what seemed like weeks.

Her Ladyship the Dowager considered her son and daughter-in-law for a long, thoughtful moment, her disapproval of their ability to resolve this parenting problem apparent. "Why don't you ask Carson about it?"

Her Ladyship, His Lordship and, indeed, the footmen stared first at the Dowager and then at the butler. Carson himself froze in place, wondering what he had done to inspire this suggestion.

"What?" His Lordship looked from his mother to the butler and back again in bewilderment.

But the Dowager was unmoved by everyone's astonishment. "Remember how he was with her as a baby? What was it – the colic, I believe - that was driving His Lordship mad." She turned to Carson. "And there were other occasions, too, weren't there, Carson? You seemed an adept with a crying child, as I recall."

Carson did not know what to say. He _had_ calmed Miss Mary a few times when she was a baby, on occasions when her exhausted or flustered parents were struggling. But he knew his success then was due to his quiet presence in a tense moment, rather than any innate talent. This was an entirely different matter.

"This is not really the time to discuss it, Mama," His Lordship said smoothly. "Nanny will get it all straightened out eventually, I'm sure."

They said nothing more on the subject, but Carson could not help but think about it. It troubled him that Miss Mary was so afflicted. He had not had the opportunity to discuss the nightmares with her directly. She hadn't been downstairs since they began, the result, he understood, of a stricter regimen that Nanny hoped would have some effect on the disturbances.

The two women rose to withdraw to the parlour and His Lordship got up as well. There was no point in dividing, not when there were only the three of them. Yet His Lordship lingered, waiting until the other two were out of the room before turning to his butler.

"I apologize for my mother, Carson. She ought not to have put you on the spot like that."

Carson waved away His Lordship's concern. "I was not discomfited, my lord."

"Good." His Lordship turned to go.

"My lord, I did wonder. About Miss Mary." He spoke hesitantly. When it came to household management, Carson spoke his mind. But this was different.

"Go on."

"I had a thought. Only I don't want to presume."

His Lordship brightened a little. "A thought! Any thoughts are welcome, Carson. We're at our wit's end about it. What do you suggest?"

So Carson told him, feeling self-conscious as he did so. They might already have tried it. He did not know. He was not privy to _all_ their conversations on the subject.

But they had not tried it. "It's as good as any of Nanny's remedies, Carson. And I daresay it makes more sense than whisky-laced milk or jogging her around the garden every afternoon. Nothing else has worked. I say, give it a go. What about tonight?"

His Lordship's enthusiasm brought Carson up short, as did the implications of his words. " _Me_ , my lord?"

"Well, it is your idea. And you never know. She might be more receptive to a fresh face." His Lordship paused. "Miss Mary is fond of you, Carson."

They rarely spoke of his relationship with the child, though Carson knew that Miss Mary related her downstairs adventures to her parents, even as she spoke to the butler about things that transpired upstairs.

Carson nodded. "Very good, my lord. And Her Ladyship?" If he was reluctant about treading on His Lordship's toes in matters relating to Miss Mary, he was more so still when it came to Her Ladyship, especially after that incident with Miss Mary and Miss Edith in the cowsheds.

His Lordship appreciated this. "I'll speak to her right now, Carson, though I daresay she will welcome any solution to the problem. Any port in a storm," he added with a smile.

 **Nighttime at Downton Abbey**

Nanny was caught between a rock and a hard place. She didn't appreciate Mr. Carson's interference. He could see that in the look she gave him when he appeared at the nursery door half an hour before midnight. But Her Ladyship had told her what was going on and she had no effective rebuttal. Her own remedies had failed. So she went to wake Miss Mary with an air of doubt mingled with resignation.

Carson didn't blame Nanny for her concerns. It was all very irregular. But they were all interested in resolving the child's problem and his idea was as good as any. And better, in his mind, than trying to drug or starve her into peace. That was an exaggeration, but he'd heard enough from conversations between His Lordship and Her Ladyship to know that a dose of brandy and manipulations of diet had been on the table.

It was a relief to the two of them that Miss Mary woke easily and, when Carson proposed that they take a walk together, she readily agreed. He could see in the flickering light of the candle he held that the prospect of an adventure appealed to her, that she relished the idea of doing something exciting that did not involve either of her sisters. In silence she put on her slippers and dressing gown and then, without a word, joined him in the passage where she eagerly took the hand he held out to her.

"You've been having bad dreams," he said, as they strolled along the gallery. There might have been some value in approaching the topic indirectly, but he thought it right to come straight to the point lest she get the idea this was some sort of lark. When a worried little look came over her at his words, he almost doubted himself. "Can you tell me what you dream about?" he asked gently.

Her eyes went round with fear. "Monsters, Mr. Carson!" she said, in a hushed voice, and then moved more closely to him, pressing against his thigh and looking about apprehensively.

"Monsters," he said gravely. He'd had no inkling of this. It intrigued him, even as it also puzzled him. "What kind of monsters?"

She shrugged. It was beyond her capacity to describe them.

"And why are you afraid of them?" No matter that this was a subject foreign to his understanding, Carson always believed in getting the facts before passing judgments or offering solutions.

"Because they're going to eat me up!" Miss Mary declared, and there was no ignoring the alarm in her voice. "And Edith and Sybil, too! They hide in dark places and come out at night."

"Do they." He pondered this. "No monster could harm you, surely. Not with Nanny standing guard all night."

"Nanny's afraid of spiders and mice," Miss Mary said scornfully. "How could she fend off a monster?"

If monsters were an irrational fear, Miss Mary had no difficulty making rational arguments about them. He took her point. "And...you believe monsters exist?" he asked cautiously, stifling his own immediate impulse to deny the validity of her fears.

The child looked up at him and he saw conviction in her eyes as she nodded emphatically. "Cousin Patrick says they're _everywhere_ , Mr. Carson. He says there are _nine different sorts_ of monsters at Croydon House."

"Ah." Cousin Patrick. Without a direct heir, Robert Crawley's title and the estate of Downton Abbey would, in the event of his untimely death, fall first to his cousin James Crawley, the son of Robert's late uncle, his father's younger brother. Master Patrick was James's son and, as such, was the second in line in the succession to the Earldom of Grantham. Carson knew the family well. They spent a great deal of time at Downton. Master Patrick, who was two years older than Miss Mary, affected a worldly wisdom because he went off to a posh boarding school where, no doubt, he had encountered more than one kind of monster. But the only monster Carson knew to inhabit Croydon House was Patrick's grandmother. Carson shared with the Dowager Lady Grantham an antipathy for that woman.

That Master Patrick was the source of Miss Mary's fears gave Carson pause. It was difficult for an adult to shake a child's confidence in the solemn pronouncements of another child.

"And now _you_ are concerned about the existence of monsters at Downton Abbey?" he ventured.

"Oh, yes, Mr. Carson! They come every night looking for us. Cousin Patrick says it's only a matter of time before they find the nursery!" There was a shrill note in her voice.

Well. Here was an angle he might pursue with some hope of success. "Oh, Master Patrick is _quite_ mistaken there, Miss Mary," he said firmly.

She stopped walking and looked up at him.

He went on. " _I_ am responsible for the safety of the house and everyone in it," he said seriously. "And I can assure you that _no one_ and _nothing_ can get into Downton Abbey when it is dark except that I let them in. And I _never_ admit monsters."

His statement did not bring her the relief for which he had hoped. "Cousin Patrick says that sometimes they sneak in during the day when the doors are open and hide in dark corners."

Master Patrick, Carson mused grimly, ought to turn his agile mind to more important matters than frightening his cousin. He took a deep breath. "I am acquainted with _all_ the dark corners of Downton Abbey and can state with authority that there are no monsters lurking in any of them." They had come to it, hadn't they? She had heard words of reassurance from Nanny and from her parents to no avail. She needed to _see_ for herself. "Come," he said, nudging her into movement again. "We shall explore the house and all of its dark corners. And then," he added, "won't you have a tale to tell Master Patrick of your night-time adventure!"

Despite her trepidation, this appealed to her, as he thought it might. She was not, he knew, a timid child and so only wanted evidence to give substance to the reassurances she had already heard.

"Did you not tell His Lordship and Her Ladyship or Nanny about the monsters?" he asked, wondering. No one had mentioned this part in his hearing.

"No!" she said emphatically. "Cousin Patrick told me I mustn't! He said that if I told Mama or Papa or Nanny, the monsters would know about it and find me more quickly."

Carson had to acknowledge Master Patrick's facility with a tale, but it was not a talent for which he had much regard. "But he did not say anything about telling a butler," he noted drily. Miss Mary had taken her cousin's warning literally, fearing to tell the usual sources of comfort because she had been warned against them, but opening up immediately to him because he was not on the list. He could understand Master Patrick's oversight. The boy was a pleasant child and could be sweet, especially to Miss Edith. But he took delight in challenging Miss Mary, perhaps because she did not worship him, as almost everyone else did. It was one of the perquisites of being an only child. And though he _was_ always polite, in Carson's observation, he also reflected the indifference to servants exhibited by his father and grandmother.

This loophole in Master Patrick's carefully drawn web meant, however, that Carson had some hope of dispelling Miss Mary's fears. He had thought to take her for a walk in the darkened Abbey, imagining some nebulous fear of the night. Now their stroll would have a more specific purpose. And it must be a grand excursion, for there were many dark corners in Downton Abbey.

They began in the Great Hall, where he showed her the bolts on the doors that he put in place every night. "Napoleon's legions could not force these doors, Miss Mary, never mind some pathetic, provincial monster." He spoke with requisite disdain for the enemies both real and imagined. Then they toured the main rooms and he pointed out the heavy shutters on the windows, laboriously closed every night by the staff and opened again in the morning. "All is secure, Miss Mary," he said, as he rattled a set of shutters to illustrate their sturdiness.

And, because they were passing by and it was a good story, he pointed at the formal portrait of a striking man whose attire placed him in the late eighteenth century. Carson forbore to explain to Miss Mary how the cutaway coat and cravat were evidence of this, focusing on more exciting matters. " _That_ is the Second Earl of Grantham. He crossed France _during_ the Revolution _and_ lived to tell the tale. And brought with him much of the art that hangs in your house." He made a mental note to tell her about the French Revolution, during the day and not in excessive detail. Who needed fantasy monsters when men like Robespierre walked the earth?

On the gallery, he took her into one of the unoccupied bedrooms and demonstrated the heavy clasps on the windows and the shutters there, too. Nanny, he knew, subscribed to the view that the night air was unhealthy for small children - utter rubbish in Carson's opinion, but it was not for him to say. He reminded Miss Mary that the windows in the nursery were never open when it was dark.

It occurred to him as they strode from room to room, passage to passage, that it was not enough to look behind curtains and under beds and behind doors to prove that no monsters lurked there. She ought, he thought, to be able to take with her back to bed a positive experience as well as evidence that the bad did not exist. And not more fantastic stories either. He would impart verifiable tales that would bolster her confidence in the truth of what he said.

"The Princess Amelia room is named for the youngest daughter of King George III. She was aunt to our Queen Victoria. Princess Amelia stayed here once, during the time of the Second Earl." That fact fit neatly with the portrait he had just shown her. "King George and his wife, the Queen Charlotte, had _fifteen_ children!" he added. Miss Mary's eyes opened wide in astonishment. "I know," he said, nodding at her. It was a detail that never failed to amaze _him_. "Imagine having fourteen brothers and sisters!"

"I've quite enough sisters," Miss Mary said determinedly. "And I shouldn't like to have a brother at all. Where would we put one?"

Well, he agreed with her about a boy. Not that Miss Mary knew it, but a brother would have relegated her to insignificance. Once he had hoped, with the family, that Her Ladyship would give birth to a son. But his affection for Miss Mary had long since dispelled that wish.

They climbed the servants' stairs to the attics which were divided between the servants' quarters - which were themselves subdivided between male and female sections - and storage space.

"Why do the men live on one side of the door and the women on the other, Mr. Carson?"

He was momentarily stumped. How to combine honesty and accuracy and yet refrain from imparting too much information? "It is customary for men and women who are unrelated to sleep in separate quarters." It wasn't an explanation at all, but she accepted it.

"All these rooms are occupied," he told her, pointing down the long passage. "There are the footmen - Stuart, Geoffrey, Peter, and Arthur. And the hallboys, Samuel, Percy, and Mark. And His Lordship's valet, Mr. Sterling. And on the other side, Mrs. Dakin, Mrs. Yardley, all the kitchen maids and housemaids and lady's maids." They were crammed to the rafters, in fact. He relished the privacy of his own room. Only Mrs. Dakin was likewise blessed. Everyone else shared. But there was a larger point to this information. "There's just room for the staff up here, Miss Mary. There isn't a spare corner for a monster."

"Do you have a room here, Mr. Carson?"

"I do. And _nothing_ happens up here that I don't know about. And I've not seen a monster yet."

At the top of the stairs to the men's quarters there was another door. Carson paused before it.

"Now we've come to the attic proper and we may find a few dark corners in here. Best we investigate them all, just to be sure." He turned the handle of the room and led the way in.

The door opened into a large, unfinished space where roof beams were not hidden by the ceilings that transformed the servants' quarters into habitable rooms. But otherwise the storage attic looked much like the drawing room when the family were in London - discarded or superfluous pieces of furniture all shrouded in white sheets. Scattered among them were trunks containing abandoned personal treasures of the past, household items no longer in use, and who knew what else. Along one wall were cupboards that Carson knew held some of His Lordship's clothing, rotated seasonally by his valet.

The taper was a poor instrument for exploring the room but it was all they had. It cast fragile streams of light into dim corners, creating a more ominous effect than solid blackness would have done. Miss Mary crowded more closely to him and clutched his free hand with both of hers.

"There are so many places a monster could hide in here," she said in a whisper. He heard a tremor in her voice.

Well, the only way to combat that was to confront it directly. "Let's look everywhere," he said, and moved ahead boldly. He set the candle holder down on a sturdy surface and whipped the nearest sheet from the object shrouded beneath it - a round table of a size that might have served one of the tenant families, if any of the estate farmers used round tables. "A relic of King Arthur," Carson muttered disdainfully. Round tables undermined authority. Rectangular tables assured that rank was preserved. Perhaps the Second Earl had brought _that_ back from revolutionary France, too. "Nothing there," he said cheerfully, glancing at Miss Mary. And then they both sneezed from the dust. And laughed. Her grip on his hand loosened.

"Come on," he urged, leading her to the next item. Together they picked their way around the attic, uncovering everything. After the fourth piece of furniture had been revealed without a monster in sight, she joined him in tugging the sheets off. In short order, there were untidy heaps of sheets on the floor amidst an assortment of tables, chairs, bedframes, and other oddities whose banishment to the attic Carson had no trouble understanding. There was also a great deal of dust in the air. It had all taken them about fifteen minutes. It would take far longer to make it right again. He would send one of the hallboys up in the morning.

"Nothing!" he declared, as they'd pulled the last sheet away.

"Nothing!" she echoed him. Her timidity was gone. She enjoyed creating the chaos of discarded sheets and dust everywhere, even in the dark room.

"No monsters," she said firmly, and he saw, in the way she look calmly about them, that she was persuaded.

He thought he might press the point. "Do you think, perhaps, Master Patrick might be having you on, Miss Mary."

She said nothing, but only got a determined look on her face. He liked that she didn't burst out in recriminations, although he thought she might be considering retaliation. He sought a distraction.

"Come here." He beckoned to one of the shuttered windows. It took him a moment to get it open - more evidence, he told her, that nothing could get into the Abbey - but when he got the latch undone, he flung the shutters wide. She came to his side eagerly now, prepared for new wonders, but she could not see over the ledge. He picked her up and held her in his arms.

"Look," he said, pointing. "A brilliant moon. And the stars. Have you ever looked at the stars, Miss Mary?"

She shook her head and as she did so he realized what a foolish question it was. Children her age were in bed and fast asleep when the stars were out. And who would tell her about them anyway?

"There are patterns in the stars," he said. "And pictures, of a sort."

"Pictures? Where?"

Now he was in for it. He only knew a few of them himself and one of them was Orion's Belt, which wasn't very interesting, even when it was visible. The most useful thing about it was that it helped you find Canus Major.

"There's a dog," he said, and told her how to see it in the alignment of stars.

"It's not a very good dog," she said, wrinkling her nose. "Edith could draw a better one."

"You have to use your imagination. And, you see, it contains the brightest star in the sky, Sirius."

"The star's name is 'serious'?"

" _Sirius. S-I-R-I-U-S_. And there's the Plough." He pointed in another direction. This was a more obvious pattern. "And if you draw a line from the two outer stars and extend it upwards, you find the North Star. If you can find the North Star, you'll never lose your way. Sailors have used it for centuries to help them navigate the seas because while all the other stars move across the sky, it stays in the same place."

This was a more satisfying tale. She stared at it in awe.

Despite his inability to identify any other constellations, she stared raptly at the sky for a few minutes, and then her gaze turned earthwards, looking for other novelties. By the light of the moon, he pointed out estate sights that were more familiar - the folly, the stables, the tip of the church steeple in Downton Village. She looked at everything entranced. His eyes rested on her, equally absorbed.

But they could not do this all night. He had to get up early and she would probably be a bear for Nanny all day for having had her sleep disrupted. Still he lingered.

"Are you hungry?" he asked suddenly.

Miss Mary turned wide eyes on him. "I'm starving, Mr. Carson! Nanny makes me eat so early now. She thinks my dinner made me have bad dreams." She paused. "I almost told her it was monsters, so that I could eat properly again." This information tripped off her tongue casually.

"What about those monsters, then?" he asked.

She thought for a moment. "There may be monsters at Croydon House, but there aren't _any_ at Downton." She looked at him with her dark, compelling eyes. "You won't ever let any monsters into Downton, will you, Mr. Carson?"

"You may rely on me for that," he said solemnly. Then he put her down and took her hand again. "It's a very long walk down to the kitchen now, and then back up again to bed. Can you manage it?"

She was eager to try.

There wasn't much to be had in the kitchen to eat, not much that wouldn't be missed, anyway. Mrs. Yardley kept a close watch on the food that came in and went out and he didn't want to fall afoul of her. Fortunately, Miss Mary wasn't fussy. He made them each a jam sandwich - Mrs. Yardley put up the jam herself and Carson had often remarked that she did wonders with already delicious strawberries - and gave her a cup of milk besides. He had none of the milk. He was already trespassing on Mrs. Yardley's good will.

They sat together at the table in the servants' hall, he on one side - forgoing his usual place at the head of the table - and she on the other. She _was_ tired, he could see that. But she was exhilarated, too.

"What are you so happy about?" he asked, smiling.

"I've never had such an adventure, Mr. Carson! No one I know ever has. I'm sure Cousin Patrick has never been all over _his_ house in the dark!"

"Nor should you have done, on your own," Carson said seriously, not wanting to encourage her to further exploits. "But it's good to do it once, so you know it all looks the same as it does in the day."

"But it doesn't!" she cried passionately. "It's...magical...at night!"

Well. He couldn't argue with that. The glimmering of the taper, the echoing creaks and groans of a house settling in the silence of the night, the twinkling stars and the shining moon illuminating Downton from the heights of attic windows ... yes, he supposed that all struck her as bewitching. But for him it was all about the company. He was charmed by her innocent awe.

"This is delicious, Mr. Carson. I've not had jam in _ages_!"

He wondered what Nanny _did_ approve for the children's consumption. But he could think about that another time. When she had swallowed the last bite and drained her cup, he stoop up and held out his hand again. "Time for bed, I think."

She stood up, too, but less energetically than she had moved earlier. The fears, the thrills, and the snack, not to mention the long walk, had caught up with her. He relented, though he had not much resistance to begin with, and took her in his arms. She nestled against his chest as he climbed the stairs to the gallery. He thought she might have fallen asleep between the kitchen and the nursery, but she hadn't, though she did yawn as he set her on her feet at the door.

"Goodness, Mr. Carson!" Nanny said reprovingly in a hushed voice, mindful of the sleeping children within. "I was about to send for the constable, wondering where you'd got to!"

"We've been _everywhere_ , Nanny," Miss Mary said, never too tired to be impertinent.

Nanny ignored her and only held out her hand to receive the child back into her care.

But Carson wasn't quite finished yet. He crouched beside Miss Mary that he might look her in the eye, and though she stifled another yawn, she readily met his solemn gaze.

"There are no monsters in Downton Abbey," he said firmly, " and now you know it. Nor will any ever darken our doors, not while I'm here. And you know that, too."

She nodded.

"So you can stop waking everyone up in the middle of the night, now, can't you?" It wasn't so much a question as an expectation. And Miss Mary nodded again.

"I'm not afraid any more, Mr. Carson."

"Well, I'm glad of it." He wanted very much to finish their adventure together by kissing her goodnight, as his mother had kissed him many years ago, but it wouldn't be proper. So he stood up again. "Right. Good night, then."

"Good night, Mr. Carson." And she took Nanny's hand and disappeared into the nursery.

He turned and headed for his own room in the servants' quarters above. He had undressed and was getting ready to get into bed, when the light from the night sky glimmering through the gap in the curtain caught his eye. Moving to the window, he pushed the curtain aside and gazed for a long moment at the bright moon and sparkling stars. How different it all looked now that he had seen it through the eyes of a child.


	11. Chapter 11: Confidence and Comfort

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **Chapter 10 Confidence and Comfort**

 **A Flight of Fancy and a Fright**

He was setting up for tea. There were cups aplenty in the kitchen, but he'd taken the notion that Miss Mary ought to have her own special cup for tea in the butler's pantry. He mentioned it Mrs. Yardley so that she would know only to send in one cup on the tray they usually prepared in the kitchen when they saw Miss Mary in the passage and she stared at him so long that he got flustered and explained more, and then realized he'd dug himself into a hole and all he could do was break it off and pretend it never happened. He couldn't see her face when she turned back to her work, but he didn't need to in order to know that she was rolling her eyes in amused exasperation.

It didn't really matter what Mrs. Yardley thought. What mattered was what _Miss Mary_ thought, and she was delighted by the blue and white china cup and saucer, and listened attentively when he told her how the Chinese had begun to make these kinds of dishes when they'd opened trade routes to the Middle East and gained access to the cobalt in Persia that made blue porcelain possible.

"Does everything come from China, Mr. Carson?" she had asked him, remembering the tea.

"Not everything. This cup, for instance, is made right here, from porcelains developed by an Englishman. The inspiring designs may have come from China, but that is a good British tea cup from which you're drinking, Miss Mary."

He'd gone a step further by keeping her cup in the locked cupboard in his pantry that contained the more valuable pieces of silver and crystal, the oversight of which was one of his particular responsibilities as butler. Miss Mary understood the significance of this and was all the more elated that he made this gesture for her.

He retrieved the cup and locked the cupboard door, and then turned to find Miss Mary putting a pillow on the chair where she sat to take her tea. This was unusual. She had told him early on that she did not want any props to make her more comfortable at the table, that she would be grown up soon enough. Remembering this, he approached her just a little puzzled, although his bewilderment did not prevent his amusement at her efforts to scramble up onto this now slightly more precarious perch.

"What's this, Miss Mary?" he asked as he set her cup down beside her.

"I'm not Miss Mary Crawley today, Mr. Carson," she informed him, returning his gaze with a serious expression.

He raised his eyebrows a little. "May I ask with whom I have the pleasure to take tea, then?" He spoke in the same solemn tones he would use to address her parents, and she almost smiled at his formality. She loved it when they played like this.

"I am the King of England," she declared firmly.

"The King." He pondered this. "Do you not mean the Queen?"

"No," she said emphatically. "I want to be the King." She saw his perplexed look. "Kings are the highest anyone can be, Mr. Carson. A queen may rule a country, but if she marries her husband is only a prince." She stated this as fact, but paused for his nod of affirmation.

"But if a _king_ rules a country, his wife is a queen. A king is higher than a queen, but there is no one higher than a king."

It was irrefutable logic. "That is so."

" _And,_ " she continued, "the King of England is the most powerful person in the world. That's what I want to be, Mr. Carson."

"Well." He was impressed with her reasoning and her ambition. He drew himself up to his full height and then bowed low before her. "Your Majesty."

She laughed, enchanted by his observance.

"And who am I?" he asked, taking his seat and preparing the tea.

"You can be the King of Siam."

"Indeed." He thought about this. "Do you know where Siam is?"

It was a familiar cue. Mary slipped from the cushion and ran to the bookshelf where he kept their atlas. With the large book in hand it was more difficult for her to resume her seat, but she managed it, and then sat with the volume open across her lap, flipping through pages.

"It's south of China," Carson said helpfully. They had looked at the pages for China on other afternoons when they'd talked about tea and Marco Polo.

But Mary was distracted. Her fingers were feathering over a completely different continent. "I've changed my mind, Mr. Carson. You can be the King of the...United...States."

She wasn't looking at him else she would have seen the look of disdain that descended on his craggy features at this. "They don't have a king," he said coolly. "They have a President." He paused. "I would rather be a minor oriental potentate than the president of a republic."

Now she did look at him, hearing the disapproval in his voice. "What's a republic?"

"It is a nation where the mob rules," he said with scorn than was not entirely affected. "Utter chaos." The fact that Miss Mary's mother, Her Ladyship, was an American had done nothing to ameliorate Carson's dim view of America.

A map of the Americas proved more absorbing than his political instruction. She drew her finger down the page around the tip of South America. "If you wanted to travel from England to China, you would have to go all the way around the Americas," she observed.

"Yes, north or south it's very treacherous." At her puzzled look, he explained. "The Strait of Magellan is dangerous." He pointed to the southern route. And when her eyes moved immediately to the top of the page, he added, "They can't go _north_ because it's all ice up there. Sir John Franklin tried it decades ago and they're still looking for him."

This fact astonished Miss Mary and for a moment she only stared at the archipelago that dotted the Arctic Ocean at the top of the page. Then she studied the continents together. "Why don't they make a canal across the...the..." She pointed to the thin strip of central America.

"Isthmus."

"...isthmus..." It was a difficult word for a child to get her tongue around. "The isthmus here, like the one between the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea?"

Almost nothing pleased Mr. Carson more than teaching a bright student. He took pride in the footmen who rose through the ranks under his instruction and was privately even a little smug at the glowing reports that filtered back to him of those few who had gone elsewhere. But Miss Mary Crawley was his favourite pupil and she never disappointed him. She remembered what he told her and, as in this instance, was able to apply those facts to other circumstances.

"That is a very good question," he said approvingly. "And Mr. Lesseps has been trying to do just that for nigh on twenty years."

They ate their cake and drank their tea and chatted about travelling the world. Carson knew that he would only ever make such journeys in his imagination here in this pantry with Miss Mary at his side. But she might well go to many of these places, with her mother's family across the water, and as part of the generation who would grow to maturity in a British Empire that encircled the globe.

Soon enough they had had their meal and it was time for Miss Mary to return to the nursery.

"Well, you'd better get on," he said, glancing at the clock on his desk. Nanny indulged them both when she allowed Miss Mary to come downstairs, but he didn't want to press his luck.

"Thank you for the tea, Mr. Carson," she said, lingering in the doorway, her hand on the frame. She gave him one of those smiles that never failed to warm his heart and then dashed away.

Just as Miss Mary disappeared, Mrs. Dakin came in. This meant that he did not have time to wipe from his face the indulgent look prompted by the child's parting words, and the housekeeper caught it. She did _not_ roll her eyes, but he sobered immediately and cleared his throat in an effort to regain his dignity.

"You're spoiling that child, Mr. Carson." She had said this before, though this time it sounded rather half-hearted.

"I don't think so," he responded evenly.

She shrugged sceptically. "It will give her a big head, and that's all any of them need."

He ignored the implied disrespect of the family. This was Mrs. Dakin, after all. In a quarter century of service to the family she had earned the right to speak her mind, discreetly, of course, and only to him and Mrs. Yardley.

"We must disagree on that," he said circumspectly. He did not clash readily with Mrs. Dakin. He'd long ago overcome the historical advantage she had over him at Downton - she had been appointed housekeeper the first year he worked in the house - but he was always respectful of her.

They were finished with that exchange. "Her Ladyship has just informed me that they've an unexpected guest coming for dinner tonight. A note arrived in the second post."

He nodded. "Thank you, Mrs. Dakin. I'll make adjustments." He paused. "Are you quite well?" He did wonder. She'd been looking pale for the past few days, but he hesitated to inquire. Health was always a delicate matter and it was usually she who did the asking.

"I am, thank you."

He was hardly surprised by this crisp response. He imagined that she would say the same thing if she'd just had her right arm cut off. Mrs. Dakin had a tough core. Almost as though she needed to prove that, she picked up the tea tray to take it to the kitchen.

"Don't do that," he said. It was quite beneath her and she had nothing to prove to him.

"It's nothing."

He turned away to put the blue and white porcelain cup on his desk. He would wash it later. Behind him Mrs. Dakin said something. At least, he thought she said something, but he didn't quite hear it. He glanced over his shoulder at her. In a split second he registered several things. It was not that he had not _heard_ what Mrs. Dakin said, but that he did not _understand_ the words. Her voice was slurred. In that blink of an eye, he saw the left side of her face give way, almost as though the bones had melted, and with this her whole left side as well. The tray slipped from her hands, crashing to the floor in almost a slow-motion arc. He saw it happening but could do nothing to arrest it. But when Mrs. Dakin herself collapsed, only an instant later, he moved reflexively, lunging forward and catching her as she fell, falling with her, his knees slamming into the floor even as he caught the deadweight of her body in his arms. At least he had prevented her head cracking against the floor. For a moment he thought he might have shattered both of his kneecaps, but knew he had not. When he opened his mouth it was not to express his own pain, but to cry for help for her.

One of the young kitchen maids - Irene - appeared almost instantly. She had probably already been on her way to fetch the tray, whose contents now lay broken and scattered across the floor. Her mouth fell open in horror at the sight of the housekeeper's body and the cry that escaped her was one of fright. She wasn't going to be much help.

"Fetch...," he began, and then faltered. In all the moments of downstairs crisis he had experienced in his years at Downton, it was Mrs. Dakin who would have been summoned. Before he resolved this dilemma, another figure appeared at the pantry door. Elsie.

"Oh, my!" She was shocked, too, but only for a second. Their eyes met for a split second over the prone body of the housekeeper who looked more and more like a fragile older woman than the steady senior staff member they had always known her to be. Then...

"Geoffrey!" Elsie had turned her head and barked the name down the passage.

There was a clattering of footsteps in response. It would occur to Mr. Carson sometime later that the footmen responded promptly to Elsie's commands, no matter that she was a housemaid and had no authority over them. She had a presence.

"Fetch Dr. Clarkson, _right away_. Tell him it's Mrs. Dakin and that it's an emergency." She brushed by the kitchen maid. "You'd best return to the kitchen, Irene," she said, firmly but almost gently. The maid ran. Then she was on her knees beside the butler and the housekeeper, reaching out to cradle Mrs. Dakin's lolling head in her hands.

Carson had regained his equilibrium. "She just collapsed," he said. "One moment we were talking and then she just...melted."

"A stroke, I think," Elsie said calmly, brushing Mrs. Dakin's forehead soothingly. "We'd better get her to bed. I'll help you."

Mrs. Dakin was a deadweight. She wasn't a heavy woman, but she was tall and had a sturdy frame. He winced as he shifted her and looked up into Elsie's inquiring gaze. She had seen his pained look.

"I caught her as she fell," he explained. "Banged my knees a bit." He said this dismissively. His discomfort was as nothing compared to Mrs. Dakin's. He look askance as Elsie slid an arm beneath the housekeeper's shoulder. The head housemaid had never shown a moment's flagging in her work since she had arrived at Downton, but she had a slim build and he didn't expect much in the way of physical strength. He was wrong.

"I'll call one of the footmen," she said, as he got to his feet. With Elsie's help he was able to lift Mrs. Dakin into his arms.

"I'll manage." He _was_ strong. And two men trying to carry an unconscious woman up a few flights of stairs would be more trouble than it was worth. "If you'll get the doors for me, please."

She nodded.

It was slow going and before they reached the servants' quarters on the top floor they were overtaken by Miss Gillard, Her Ladyship's lady's maid. She said nothing until Carson had laid Mrs. Dakin out on her bed.

"Is there anything I can do?" she asked, her eyes flitting between the other two.

"You can help me," Elsie said briskly, already reaching to loosen Mrs. Dakin's clothing. "If you'll wait outside, Mr. Carson."

Again their eyes met. It was a suggestion, not an order. There were things that needed attending to and a man had no place in them. He nodded and stepped out.

He had never been on the women's side of the door that separated the servants' quarters. The novelty of it escaped him now. There were things he could do. One of them was to inform Her Ladyship. The other was to wait at the front door to let the doctor in.

 **A Comforting Hand**

He was sitting on the stairs of the servants' staircase, on the men's side, just at the point where they divided. He had never sat on stairs before, even in his days as a footman. Mr. Finch would not have allowed it. And it was certainly inappropriate for the butler of Downton Abbey now. Undignified. Not fitting to his elevated station. He sat anyway, feeling...hollow.

The doctor - Clarkson, with whom Carson had as yet no more than a passing acquaintance - had been and gone and all the news was bad. It was indeed a stroke, a massive one that had paralyzed Mrs. Dakin's whole left side. The doctor held out little hope for meaningful recovery. In the meantime, Mrs. Dakin could not stay at Downton. They did not have the facilities to care for her properly, not at this stage. There was a nurse in attendance on her now, until arrangements were made to move her to the hospital. She wouldn't be there very long either. Dr. Clarkson was even now gone to look into longer term care.

In some houses, Mrs. Dakin might have found herself thrown on the charity of the state, but not at Downton. Her Ladyship had come upstairs as soon as she heard of Mrs. Dakin's misfortune and was quick to allay any concerns on this score. If Mrs. Dakin could not be attended in familiar surroundings, she would at least have the benefit of quality care. Her Ladyship's swift assurances had impressed Carson. This was, in his mind, only as it should be, and he was glad that Her Ladyship had risen to the mark.

He was not bothered about the impact of Mrs. Dakin's malady on Downton. It was, in the moment, irrelevant to him in the face of his concerns for the woman herself. But she had also taken care, and now he saw this more clearly, to prepare for such an eventuality. She had hired and been training a successor in the head housemaid Elsie, in much the same way as Mr. Finch had groomed a young Carson to become the butler of Downton Abbey. The difference was, Carson suspected, that Mr. Finch had expected to preside over the Abbey for many more years than he'd been given, while Mrs. Dakin appeared to have had a greater appreciation for her own mortality. And her confidence in the housemaid had not been misplaced. The younger woman had already stepped into the breach.

Carson was impressed with her, too. When they'd made Mrs. Dakin comfortable and Miss Gillard went away again, he'd slipped back into the room and stood there beside Elsie, watching the unconscious woman.

"You knew." It was a question more than a statement.

"I guessed," she said. "But I couldn't be sure. She told me nothing."

Carson was not surprised. Mrs. Dakin was a proud woman who had worked hard to get where she was. She might have recognized the limits of her own strength, but she was not about to admit them to others.

"You've been doing some of her work," he observed quietly, looking at Elsie out of the corner of his eye.

Her gaze remained on Mrs. Dakin. "I didn't think you'd noticed."

"I did."

He intended to recommend to Her Ladyship, at the first opportunity, that the woman be permanently appointed as housekeeper. He was not inclined to challenge Mrs. Dakin's judgment in her own jurisdiction, but the evidence of his eyes had erased any possibility of doubt. She was a little outspoken, of course, and tended to address him more collegially than deferentially, but those were matters that might be resolved. They would mourn Mrs. Dakin's loss, of course, and miss her - he certainly would - but life at Downton would go on with remarkably little disruption for all that the housekeeper had kept it all together for a quarter of a century and more.

Carson _was_ bothered over Mrs. Dakin herself. The vision of her giving way like that, in his pantry - and she always a pillar of strength - would stay with him for a long time. And he mourned with her for her now circumscribed future. They wouldn't know for a while the extent of the paralysis, but Carson knew from observation of members of his own family the deleterious effects of a physical ailment on the physical and emotional well-being of a vigorously independent soul. The palsy that had affected his father and grandfather (and that, please God, might pass him by) was nothing like the stroke that had brought Mrs. Dakin low, although the strain had weighed heavily on the two men and broken his father's heart. The housekeeper had quite a struggle ahead of her.

It was the vulnerability such episodes revealed that shook him. It was a self-evident truth, but that fact did not detract from the shock of it, that one just never knew. The suddenness of it all was both frightening and humbling.

He heard a step on the stair and knew he ought to get to his feet no matter who it was. But his heart was too heavy. He raised his eyes that his gaze might fall on the interloper and he was startled to see a child on the stair below.

"Miss Mary!"

She hesitated at his declaration, not certain whether he was welcoming her or not, but then he gave her a half-hearted smile and she continued her ascent.

"What are you doing up here?" he asked. He was a little discomfited to see her. Although his heart always leapt at the sight of her, this was not a good time.

"Nanny said I could come," she said hurriedly, as though anticipating an adverse reaction from him. "She said Mrs. Dakin was taken ill." She spoke in a subdued voice, befitting the circumstances. He appreciated the effort.

Carson nodded. "She has."

Miss Mary had reached him and without waiting for direction from him she sat by his side. She did not seem to think it strange to find the formal Mr. Carson in such an undignified position. For a long moment neither of them spoke. Carson wondered fleetingly what he had done to gain Nanny's favour to such an extent that she would indulge Miss Mary in this fashion. And then, unthinking, he sighed, as his mind slipped back to a consideration of Mrs. Dakin.

"Will she be all right?" Miss Mary asked, still speaking in a hushed tone.

He hesitated only for a second or two. The episode with her nightmares had alerted him to the possibility that a disturbing incident like this might frighten her. But then he remembered that she had experienced her grandfather's death - peripherally, at least. And it was his own conviction that reality, though sometimes harsh, was less frightening than ignorance. If pressed, he would add to that that he thought Miss Mary tougher than she looked. So he told her the truth.

"No," he said gravely. "She won't."

Silence enveloped them once more as she digested this. And then she reached out and put her hand over his, resting on his knee. She said nothing, did not even look at him, but only tightened and then relaxed her hand on his in what he recognized as an effort to comfort him.

And he was comforted. The grief of the afternoon's event did not dissipate. Nothing concrete changed. But his heart filled with gratitude and love, and not a little pride in Miss Mary for wanting to be with him in this moment. And then he felt a little pang of bittersweet satisfaction. His little girl was growing up.


	12. Chapter 12 Building Character

**Chapter 11 Character Building**

 **An Accident**

Mr. Carson and Mrs. Hughes were together in the housekeeper's sitting room. In anticipation of the house party planned for the end of the month - the first since her appointment to the senior woman's position - they were going over the details. Mrs. Hughes wasn't adverse to the conversation and this pleased the butler. He saw that she was not so consumed with territoriality, and was more interested in getting the job done well. She might have been less receptive if he were the interfering type, but he wasn't. She'd already proven her competence in the day-to-day responsibilities, asking questions when she had them but not timid about putting her own imprint on those things with which she felt at ease. They were slowly mapping their working relationship, and there had been a few bumps in the road, but overall they were getting on.

He set aside the accounts book in which she had listed several expenditures relating to the upcoming event. "Your accounting is unimpeachable, Mrs. Hughes." He'd had a time of it with that name. She'd been 'Elsie' for the past few years and he had to keep thinking about it to get the formal title right.

"Thank you, Mr. Carson. Maths were my strength at school."

He consulted a hand-written list. "So we've still got..."

A knock at the half-closed door drew their attention and Irene, one of the kitchen maids, put her head in. "Miss Mary's come down, Mr. Carson. Shall I fetch tea to your pantry?"

Miss Mary did not make appointments to see him. Nor did they have a regular schedule for tea. She turned up when she was inclined to, or was let, and he tried to accommodate her. He wavered for only the fleetest moment. "Yes," he said. "Thank you, Irene." He turned to Mrs. Hughes. "We were just about finished here anyway, weren't we?"

It wasn't really a question and she understood that. She glanced deliberately at the list in his hand and then, shrugging, got to her feet. "If you say so," she murmured, moving from the small table at which they had been sitting to her desk.

He didn't like that. She didn't approve of Miss Mary, he thought. But the child's visits were none of her business. He was wondering whether or not he ought to say something when there was a crash and a cry from the butler's pantry across the passage. He leaped to his feet and dashed to the source of the turmoil, with Mrs. Hughes at his heels.

He paused at the pantry door for a fraction of a second, long enough to take in the scene within. Miss Mary lay sprawled on the floor by the cupboard within which the several most precious pieces of silver and crystal were stored. The door of the cupboard itself, which was always locked, was wide open. There was an upset chair by Miss Mary's side and splintered glass lay all around. Carson strode to her side, crunching crystal beneath his shoes, and, reaching for her, swept her into his arms. She was eight years old, but still feather light to him, not least because of the adrenalin fear had pumped into him. He swung her clear of the damage and carried her across the room, depositing her on the chair where she usually took her tea. Her eyes were wide with alarm and she clung to him a little, even as he put her down.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Carson!" she blurted, her eyes fixed on his.

He swept aside the apology. His first priority was to ensure that she was all right and he dropped to one knee beside her, his eyes raking her from top to toe looking for signs of blood."Never mind that, Miss Mary. Have you cut yourself anywhere?"

She shook her head and he exhaled in relief.

He'd been vaguely aware that Mrs. Hughes had followed him into the room and then disappeared. Then she was with them again, a broom and dustpan in her hands. He scrambled to his feet.

"I'll do that."

She fixed him with a look and then her gaze shifted to Miss Mary, a wordless directive to attend to the child. He nodded and turned his attention to the girl once more.

"What happened?"

It was one of the management lessons Mr. Finch had taught him, to ask the neutral question - _What happened?_ \- rather than the one that implied blame - _What did you do?_ Awaiting her response he saw her eyes glisten. Were those tears in _Miss Mary's_ eyes? He put a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"I was only getting my teacup out, Mr. Carson. And it was so high up. When I reached for it, I knocked the goblet over and then I fell trying to catch it.

His blood chilled when she said _goblet_ and his head twisted around to scrutinize the cabinet. _Which_ goblet? _Not the Prince Alfred_... His eyes sought those prized crystal pieces, a wedding gift to His Lordship and Her Ladyship from the Duke of Edinburgh and his wife, the Princess Maria Alexandrovna. Then relief engulfed him as he saw the pair of them still sitting on the high shelf, and he closed his eyes for a moment in a prayer of thanks to a kind God. When he opened them again, he found Mrs. Hughes staring at him, in her hand the dustpan filled with the crystal that had shattered across the floor.

"I'll throw this out," she said, gesturing with the pan. At his nod, she moved to the door, slipping past the kitchen maid arriving with the tea.

The very conventionality of this ritual restored Carson somewhat. He picked up the chair Miss Mary had fallen from and set it in its place. Then he reached into the cupboard for the child's tea cup and his eyes went to the now-empty space immediately adjacent to it and his heart sank once more. One of _those_ goblets. Well, there was nothing he could do about the loss in the moment, so he composed himself and returned to the table, Miss Mary, and their tea. Without conscious thought he had closed the cupboard door and pulled the key from its slot, as he had done hundreds of times before, slipping it into a pocket in his waistcoat.

She still looked stricken. "It was an accident, Mr. Carson," she said earnestly, her eyes following him.

"I know it was," he said quietly. "Don't distress yourself over it."

But she was not calmed and clearly needed to explain herself further. "I thought I would get things ready," she went on. "I got the key to the cupboard and tried to get my teacup myself."

 _The key_. He nodded again. "Have your tea," he said, pouring the milk and tea and pushing her cup over to her. Then his gaze turned to the cupboard once more. He'd never broken anything in the several years he'd been at Downton, not even as a footman. And since he'd become the butler, no harm had come to any of the valuable pieces under his immediate supervision. He'd made certain that everything was handled with extraordinary care. It pained him to have failed. It wasn't just a matter of treating things carefully but of ensuring that others took care as well. _The damned key._

Her eyes followed his line of vision. "Actions have consequences."

The words stirred him from his uneasy reveries. "I beg your pardon, Miss Mary."

"Actions have consequences," she said again in a sombre tone. "That's what you told me when I... I locked Edith in the cowsheds." She faltered a little as she referred to that incident. She had not explicitly told him, even then, that she had done it on purpose though he was sure she had. He wondered at her acknowledging it now. And yet he not did not react to her confession. They had dealt with it and moved on.

"So they do," he said, and waited to hear what it was she really wanted to say.

She took a deep breath. "You told me I couldn't come for three weeks, then. So...this time I think it must be one month complete, Mr. Carson. As a punishment for taking your key and breaking the goblet. Do you think that's enough?" She spoke solemnly, but her dark eyes were fixed on his in a silent appeal.

He almost smiled at her imposing exile on herself. And thinking hurting him a more serious affair than tormenting her sister. "It was an accident, Miss Mary. That wasn't so with the cowsheds." A more contrite look came over her face at his acceptance of her admission.

"But I must pay for it somehow, Mr. Carson." She thought for a minute. "I'd shut myself up in a _convent_ for a month," she declared, making what appeared to be the supreme sacrifice, and then added, more than a little bewildered, "if I knew what a convent was."

Now he did smile, despite the situation, though he was as puzzled as she was. "Where did you come up with that?"

Miss Mary groaned. "Fraulein Kelder," she said darkly, referring to the governess who now gave lessons to her and Miss Edith. "She says they're good places for _bold_ girls!" She made a face. "I shouldn't want to spend a _week_ in one of them."

"No fear of that, Miss Mary. His Lordship would never agree." He looked at her for a long moment. "It was an accident," he said firmly. "Though you must remember not to touch any of my things again without permission."

She nodded vigorously, eager to please him and not unhappy about escaping punishment.

It wasn't the best tea they'd ever had together. He could not keep his gaze from straying to the empty space on the shelf and it was more of a struggle than he'd anticipated to keep his temper in check. She, in turn, was subdued. When she had gone, he moved to his desk. He had work enough to occupy him but he could hardly think of anything but the broken goblet. And the key. _How could he have been so negligent?_

Voices in the passage, laughing,... no, _giggling_...drew his attention. Lunging to his feet, he stormed into the corridor and found himself in the midst of what he could only describe as a gaggle of housemaids. " _What is going on here?_ " he demanded in an intemperate roar.

The maids quieted immediately and clustered awkwardly, compounding the unattractive image of geese. He had a fleeting impression of wide eyes and startled countenances and then another voice broke the taut silence.

"What _is_ going on here, Mr. Carson?"

He whirled to find Mrs. Hughes coming out of her sitting room, a frown on her face and her cool blue eyes fixed exclusively on him.

"What's all this noise about?" he snapped, suddenly defensive. "Why are all these things in the way?" He gestured at several buckets and mops standing to one side, and cast a dark look at the now motionless housemaids before focusing on the housekeeper once more. "This is the passage, not the scullery!"

Mrs. Hughes's gaze lingered on him for a moment and then she turned to the three young women who were watching this exchange with a sort of fascinated horror. "Come along now, girls. Get the cleaning things put away and wash up for your tea." She spoke with a forced calm. The housemaids hastened to obey, gathering up their tools and disappearing down the passage without a peep out of any of them.

Annoyed by every aspect of this encounter, Mr. Carson turned away in a huff, retreating to his office without a word to the housekeeper. To his greater irritation, she followed him.

"It wasn't their fault," she said to his back.

He stopped behind his desk and turned around. "They were blocking the passage, making an inordinate amount of noise, and not going about their work," he said forcefully, staring right back at her. He did not like the look she was giving him.

"They have been hard at it all day, they've come down for their tea, and they put their things down for just a moment." Her voice was as brittle as his. "And may I remind you, Mr. Carson, that the maids are _my_ responsibility, not yours."

He bristled at this. Of course, she was right there. "They were in _everyone's_ way," he said acidly.

"They weren't in anyone's way," she responding, waving dismissively. "They were just an easy target. And, let me repeat myself, it wasn't _their_ fault."

"I don't know what you mean." He wasn't given to disingenuous statements, but occasionally he lapsed.

"Oh, I think you do."

They stared boldly at each other for a long moment and then he looked away and sat down.

She approached his desk and, even without looking at her, he could tell her temper was shifting even as his deflated. "Was it very valuable?" she asked quietly.

Of course that was it and they both knew it. So he surrendered. "It wasn't priceless," he said, with a sigh, "unless you're counting sentiment." At Mrs. Hughes's inquiring expression he added, "It's one of a set given to Her Ladyship by her paternal grandmother. She is fond of them beyond their simple monetary worth." He exhaled heavily. "I won't trouble her about it tonight when they've got guests. I'll tell her in the morning."

The housekeeper lingered. "Miss Mary will be in for it then, I imagine," she said.

He was distracted by this. Did she _want_ the child to be in trouble? But he said nothing.

"You _are_ going to tell them _she_ did it, I hope." Mrs. Hughes's tone was curt. "You can't take responsibility for _her_ wrongdoing!" She was staring at him, aghast at the thought.

"But I _am_ responsible, Mrs. Hughes." He spoke evenly, not responding to her indignation. He had recovered his poise and remembered exactly who _was_ at fault. "As I am responsible for everything that occurs under my supervision."

She made an exasperated sound. "She took your key, opened your cabinet, and broke a valuable piece of crystal. Those things are locked up for good reason. How did she get the key anyway?"

It was the very thing that had been weighing on his mind. He kept the key in a concealed compartment in his top desk drawer. Her cunning little fingers had discovered it in an early exploration of his desk. He had never explicitly identified the key or its use, but she had seen him take it from there on more than one occasion and knew its purpose. And he did not need Mrs. Hughes to exacerbate his sense of culpability.

"I am sorry I spoke of turn to the maids," he said, turning the conversation. "I don't think we need discuss this any further," he added coolly, giving her a meaningful look.

But she was determined to have the last word. "You're doing her no favours, Mr. Carson." And then she left before he could respond, which was just as well, as her words spiked his temper again. After all, he knew Miss Mary much better than she did.

And he had more pressing matters before him, not least of which were the preparations for the small dinner party that evening. Before he did anything else, however, he removed the key from his waistcoat pocket and fixed it to the chain of his pocket watch. He had trusted to the security of the desk, as Mr. Finch had before him, but Mr. Finch had never played host to a curious little girl. He ought perhaps to have anticipated that, but he would certainly not be caught out that way again.

 **Called to Account**

He spoke to His Lordship and Her Ladyship the next morning after breakfast. It was not an unpleasant interview, although he found it uncomfortable both because he did not like to make mistakes and because Her Ladyship was distressed. Afterwards he returned to the butler's pantry and to the wine inventory which was his task for the morning. He did not know that he had expected Mrs. Hughes to look in, but sighed with an air of resignation when she did so. She was more curious than Mrs. Dakin, he thought, and he was not at all sure he liked that.

"How did it go?"

Well, at least she made no pretense about her purpose.

"I've not been sacked, if that's what you're wondering," he said drily.

She did not grace this with a reply, but only waited for him to expand on his statement.

"Her Ladyship _was_ disappointed," he admitted, and then gestured her into the pantry. If she was determined to have a conversation about this then they could at least conduct it discretely. "His Lordship made light of it - _We'll have to have parties of ten, rather than twelve, when we use them_ , he said - And they both acknowledged that accidents occur." He paused and stared meaningfully at her. "I assured them nothing like this would happen again."

"And you left out the part about Miss Mary," she said, apparently determined to press the issue.

For a long moment they dueled with their eyes.

"You think I'm being foolish," he said finally, a little rankled by her disapproval, but with no intention of changing his mind either.

"No," she said quietly. "Not foolish, Mr. Carson. Just misguided."

They parted again.

 **Taking Responsibility**

The butler of Downton Abbey did not serve tea to the family. They had their hour with the children, during which the staff enjoyed their own tea, and then the footmen served His Lordship and Her Ladyship, while the butler attended to the preliminaries for dinner. Carson was, then, slightly disconcerted when Geoffrey, who was supposed to be upstairs, appeared at the pantry door.

"His Lordship would like you to come up, Mr. Carson."

Perplexed, he went.

He entered the library to find His Lordship and Her Ladyship seated on the sofa, their tea in hand, and Miss Mary sitting across from them. She should have been upstairs with the other girls, but he supposed he knew what this was about. They all looked up when he came in and Miss Mary stood. This in itself was out of the ordinary, and her hands fluttering uncharacteristically by her side testified further to the novel circumstances.

"Thank you, Geoffrey, Stuart," His Lordship said, with a glance at the footmen.

The two young men, understanding this as a dismissal, withdrew, though not before exchanging apprehensive looks. Carson knew they thought this private conference was about them and some failing on their part. He would set them right about it later.

"My lord," Carson said. Miss Mary had turned her dark eyes, round with agitation, on him, but he attended to His Lordship.

"Carson, Miss Mary has informed us that there is something she has to say and she wanted you to be here when she said it." His Lordship spoke lightly, untroubled by his daughter's peculiar request. Her Ladyship appeared less sanguine. The disquiet in her countenance was mirrored in that of her child.

"Go on, darling," His Lordship said gently, encouraging her.

Miss Mary addressed her mother. "You were very cross about Mr. Carson breaking the goblet, Mama," she said, with a child's bluntness.

A faint blush tinged Her Ladyship's cheeks. She had responded to Carson's announcement that morning with a controlled disappointment, in keeping with the dispassionate behaviour expected (if not always observed) by the well bred ruling class, but Carson was not surprised that she had expressed her displeasure more vehemently when alone with her family.

"But he didn't break the goblet," Miss Mary went on. "I did." Now that the words had been spoken, she seemed to lose the fretfulness that had gripped her. Her shoulders relaxed and her hands stilled. Only her gaze, fixed on her mother, retained any sense of uncertainty.

Her Ladyship stared, uncomprehending, but His Lordship looked puzzled. "What?"

Miss Mary took a deep breath and embarked on what Carson thought sounded like a planned recitation. "I was waiting for Mr. Carson to come into the pantry so we could have our tea. I wanted to get out the special cup I drink my tea from, so I took the key out of his desk and opened the cupboard. Only my tea cup was so high, I needed a chair. And when I reached for it, I knocked over the goblet."

The pantry was the butler's preserve, but it was not sacrosanct. His desk was something else. "You shouldn't have been going through Mr. Carson's things," Her Ladyship said in admonishment, frowning a little.

Miss Mary nodded. "I know, Mama. Mr. Carson told me I must never do so again." Now she turned his way. "I'm sorry, Mr. Carson. I didn't want you to be sent away for something I'd done."

There was a tightness in his chest. He was very proud of her. But he only inclined his head, as he would in acknowledgment of a comparable statement from her parents. "Thank you, Miss Mary," he said solemnly.

Accustomed to his undemonstrative manner in this room, she gave him a little smile and then returned her attention to her mother. "I'm sorry, Mama. I didn't mean to break your goblet. I won't do anything like that ever again."

"I believe you," Her Ladyship said, any irritation at the incident subsiding with her daughter's apology, although she glanced somewhat more critically at the butler.

"I have already made adjustments," he intoned, responding to this.

And then Miss Mary hugged her Mama, and her Papa, too, for good measure, and, reassured that Carson would not be going anywhere, she skipped from the room, relieved of the burden she had carried for a day.

"Carson." Her Ladyship's tone was less disappointed this time, than disapproving. "Why didn't you tell us that Miss Mary had broken the goblet?"

"It was an accident, my lady, and one for which I bear responsibility. I left the key where she might find it and I never made clear to her that she must not use it or that the pieces in the cupboard were out of bounds to her."

He could tell that this did not satisfy Her Ladyship, but His Lordship intervened.

"I think we've said enough about this," he said. "Thank you, Carson."

Carson nodded and turned to leave.

"Oh, Carson," His Lordship added, as though just remembering it, "there are some things in the small library that need clearing. I was going to ask the footmen to attend to it, but..."

"Very good, my lord." Carson withdrew to the alcove off the main library where there were, indeed, some few dishes that had escaped the staff's morning sweep. He would have to speak to the footmen about this oversight.

Out of sight in the small library, Carson could still hear what was being said in the larger room.

"Really, Cora."

"Robert! Your butler was covering up for Mary!"

" _Your butler_. Oh, my darling."

"Couldn't he have given us an honest account?"

"But he did. In Carson's mind, he _does_ bear responsibility for the incident and I'm not completely disinclined to agree with him, although he cannot be expected to anticipate a child's every action. And when it comes to it, I'm glad he said nothing."

"Why?"

"Because Mary could have let him take the blame. She didn't have to own up to it. But she put the truth and her regard for Carson ahead of her own well-being, and that is something we ought to welcome."

"I think the butler ought to put truth first, too."

His Lordship sighed. "Carson is who he is and frankly I've no complaints about him. But Mary _is_ our concern. It was important for her to tell us herself, to risk our wrath in owning up to the truth.

To have spoken up today, that is a display of _character_ , Cora. And I think that's worth a dozen goblets. And a butler whose feelings sometimes cloud his judgment."

Their voices dropped and Carson thought it discrete to withdraw, leaving His Lordship and Her Ladyship to their privacy. As he descended to the servants' floor, it occurred to him that His Lordship was well aware of the acoustic idiosyncrasies of the house and knew as well as anyone that a conversation in the library could not help but be overheard in the annex.

He did not have the opportunity to speak privately with Mrs. Hughes again until the end of the evening, when once again she looked in on him before going up for the night. Mrs. Dakin had always taken a moment with the butler at the end of the day, in case either of them had any concerns about that day or the next, and Mrs. Hughes had absorbed the habit.

"I've got one of the maids coming down with a cold," she told him. "I've told her to stay in bed tomorrow morning, so there'll be a little catch-up for the others."

He nodded. "Thank you, Mrs. Hughes. If it makes things more convenient for your staff, you may leave the dusting up of the pantry to the last. I've no objections." His accommodating manner was poor recompense for his earlier behaviour, but the gesture was a necessary one.

"Thank you, Mr. Carson."

She turned to go.

"Miss Mary confessed," he said abruptly.

She glanced back over her shoulder. "I beg your pardon?"

He didn't know why he'd blurted that out, but now he had to explain himself. "Miss Mary told her parents," he said awkwardly and then stared at her, daring her to challenge him.

"Did she."

Mrs. Hughes, he had noticed, played her cards close to her chest. He could not tell what she was thinking. But now that he'd opened the door, he realized there was something he wanted to say to her.

"There is more than one way of teaching responsibility, Mrs. Hughes."

Now she nodded, acknowledging his words, but still giving away nothing. "Well," she said finally. "Perhaps you're right." She met his searching gaze with a keen look of her own. "Good night, Mr. Carson."


	13. Chapter 13: Crisis

**Chapter 12 Crisis**

 **More Change**

Mrs. Yardley rarely visited him in the butler's pantry. Although they both had legitimate claims to being very busy, he more often than not went to her when there was something to discuss. He might be the superior member of staff, but it was more difficult for her to get away from her work. And the occasions when the subjects of their conversations were too discrete for a resolution over the trestle table with her pounding bread dough or stuffing a chicken as they spoke were also few and far between. They had nothing personal and confidential between them. Until now, apparently.

When Mrs. Yardley came into the pantry and closed the door over, Mr. Carson stood up. He had accorded this courtesy to the senior staff women, both the cook and the housekeeper, as an acknowledgment of their longstanding service which pre-dated by decades his assumption of the butler's role, and he had extended the practice to Mrs. Hughes as a matter of habit. Mrs. Yardley's behaviour startled him for its novelty. He was even more taken aback when the cook asked if she might sit. And though he'd had no inkling of concerns regarding her, he thought he might make an educated guess as why she was here. With this in mind, he resumed his seat heavily.

"I've decided to retire, Mr. Carson." Mrs. Yardley was never a woman to hedge about things.

It was a blow. He couldn't conceal it and it flustered him. He said the first thing that came into his head. "But you're not old enough!"

She flashed him a grateful smile. "Thank you for that. But I am. I was sixty-five my last birthday." Perhaps moved by his shocked look she added, "That's the retirement age in Germany."

Predictably he scowled, as he frequently did at references to the way they did things on the Continent. "An invention of that Prussian pomposity Bismarck," he grumbled. "Probably devised to rid himself of some unwanted advisors." She would appreciate his allusion to the Iron Chancellor. Mrs. Yardley was buried in the kitchen, but she had always read the papers.

"Nevertheless," she said firmly. "It's Mrs. Dakin has put me to thinking this way."

That did not surprise him. The health catastrophe that had struck the long-time housekeeper had shaken them all. "But she _had_ to retire after her stroke," he protested. He left unsaid that Mrs. Yardley looked as ever, which was to say that she had lost none of her usual robustness.

"Yes," she agreed. "She did. But I'd rather not wait for my health to go. I'd like to get what I can out of life while it's still possible. I've worked hard all my days, Mr. Carson," she added.

"I know it," he said warmly.

"And I'd like to think there's something more to it all than getting meals on the table eight times a day."

He was bewildered, but too polite to say what he was thinking.

Mrs. Yardley, perhaps reading his mind, laughed. "You're wondering how I'll find it now, at my age, if I've not got it already. It may shock you to learn that there's still quite a bit of life left in a body at sixty-five. A woman can still change her whole life. Maybe even a man can. You'll see for yourself, one day."

But he remained sceptical. _Mrs. Yardley venturing out into the world at her age?_ "What will you do?"

The look she gave him contained a measure of pity and he recoiled from it. Was she feeling sorry for him?

"Well, I have my pension. And I'm going to live with my sister. Her husband died two years ago and she's wanting for company her own age. We always got on. And she's got a family - children and grandchildren." She paused for a moment, as if trying to find the words to make him see things as she saw them. "I want to enjoy my relations, Mr. Carson. I want to get to know them again. Because in the end, that's all you've got, isn't it?" She sat back in her chair and they stared at each other for a long moment, over the expanse of his desk and the somewhat greater chasm of understanding. "But I won't leave until the new year," she said, in a crisp tone that was more in keeping with the Mrs. Yardley he had always known. "And not until you've found a new cook. That'll give you four months at least. One big departure is quite enough for 1899."

And having had her say, she got up and left. As always, she had many things to do. Behind her, Carson sat for several minutes, pondering her declaration. And then he realized that it was time to ring the gong.

 **Unease**

Mrs. Yardley's announcement had repercussions. Although her earliest departure date was months away, he had to begin the process of finding a replacement. No voice would be more valuable in this than her own. And he had to inform His Lordship and Her Ladyship. Maids and footmen might come and go without troubling them with the details, but critical personnel - the cook, the housekeeper, His Lordship's valet, Her Ladyship's lady's maid - required consultation, though the butler was, in the end, responsible for the actual hiring. They were both dismayed, though for different reasons.

"I grew up with her," His Lordship said, in a voice mingling regret and resignation. "It will be like a piece of Downton falling away to see her go."

Carson concurred. "It is difficult to imagine the place without her," he said, never having known it otherwise.

Her Ladyship had more pragmatic concerns. "Goodness! First Mrs. Dakin, and now Mrs. Yardley! Downton is being shaken to its foundations! How will you cope, Carson?" Her eyes were round with consternation at the prospect of such domestic turmoil.

"Not quite to the foundations, my lady," Carson said drily. "We'll manage." He was not greatly impressed with Her Ladyship's dramatics. _He_ was there, after all. And there were cooks out there, as there had been housekeepers. He did not like the idea of change either, though he accepted that neither Mrs. Dakin nor Mrs. Yardley could be expected to go on forever.

To his surprise, Mrs. Yardley's declaration affected him on a more personal level. In his few quiet moments, it was her rationalization for going, not the decision itself, that preyed on his mind, especially her comments about family.

 _Because in the end, that's all you've got, isn't it?_

If that were the case, then he had nothing, for he had no family. Not anymore. Mum and Dad were dead, and his only brother, too, all of them lying out in the Downton churchyard beneath a slab of stone that recorded their births and deaths, and nothing else about them. He had no one else. Oh, Mum had a brother who lived over the other side of Manchester, and there'd been children - they would be his cousins - but he'd never seen them. Mum had written to her brother over the years, but there'd rarely been any answers. And even that had lapsed with her death, all a long time ago.

And that wasn't really what Mrs. Yardley was talking about anyway. Or, at least, not how her words translated in his mind. She'd been talking about husband and wife, children, that sort of family. And he didn't have that either. He'd put away all ideas of a family when he'd returned to service. And he'd not thought about it again, until now.

He _had_ had ideas, once, about a life other than service. He'd even pursued that dream, if only for a few years in his youth. And though he did not now think much of the avenue he had chosen, it was the principle of the thing - the idea of a life, a _conventional_ life, though his had been anything _but_ conventional - that was really important.

He'd loved before, too. He still didn't want to remember Alice, think about Alice, but _love_ , that was something else. In the mornings, as he looked at himself in the mirror while shaving, he began to consider. If he were ever to make the break at all, surely now was the time. He could attract a woman, he was sure of that. He was thirty-nine years old, still in the prime of life. He was reasonably good-looking (if you could see beyond that nose), in good health, had savings, and was skilled and experienced enough to find good employment. And he thought himself a kind and generous man. And he wanted children. He would love children, even the children of some other man - he knew that well enough.

He would have to leave service. Marriage within service wasn't done. Oh, there was an oddity here and there who had broken the code and even made it work. But being the odd man out had never appealed to him. He believed in doing things properly and in the value of rules. Some might have pushed the boundaries of convention, but that was not his way.

Not that there was much in the way of possibilities anyway. He seldom had the opportunity to meet women in other houses and the prospects at Downton were limited. The female staff, most of them, were too young for him, and, if he were honest with himself, not his intellectual calibre at all. He could not imagine marrying a woman with whom he could not converse about the things that were important to him beyond the daily grind. The only woman downstairs at Downton who was near his age was the new housekeeper, Mrs. Hughes. She was still largely an unknown quantity, as he had had little to do with her when she was head housemaid and had not made much progress in getting to know her better in the few months since her promotion. More to the point, he found her abrasive and assertive, too forward for his liking. She was not his kind at all. Nothing like Alice, who was a gentle soul, with a quiet warmth and wit. And who had fallen for Charlie Grigg, heaven help us!

All that to say that he would need to leave Downton in order to establish a family of his own. That would be an inconvenience while he searched for employment and settled himself elsewhere, and an emotional wrench, for he did love the house, the work, and his surroundings. But were these not hardships worth weathering? And it wouldn't be that difficult to find congenial employment. His work as a butler, overseeing the operation of a great house and the work of a vast staff, had given him invaluable managerial experience. And His Lordship would give him a sterling reference, he didn't doubt that.

Finding a job would not be a problem, then. Finding a good wife - well, that was another thing altogether. But first things first. He would explore the prospects for employment before he started to look at women again.

So he began to read the job postings in the papers, retiring to his pantry every morning with his own copies of the local papers and those from more far-flung jurisdictions, especially those from London. With the latter he thumbed his way quickly past the storm clouds gathering on the front pages, past national news that no longer absorbed him in quite the same way. In June, he'd read with interest about the breakdown of negotiations with the Boers at Bloemfontein over the rights of the _uitlanders_ in the Transvaal. But the demand for full voting rights for those British residents in the region, issued by Colonial Secretary Joseph Chamberlain in September, hard on the heels of Mrs. Yardley's declaration, failed to draw more than a passing glance from him as his eyes roamed the pages searching for promising opportunities. Was he better suited for a position in hotel or factory management? He thought he could try for either, although he would prefer to live in London rather than one of the manufacturing cities. Mr. Chamberlain's powerbase, incidentally, was Birmingham. What a dreadful prospect.

Even as he focused on positions that would allow him to exploit the skills he'd developed in service, he drifted back toward the only alternative he had ever known. On one of his half-days, he went to York to see a show. And then the next week, he went back again. When he'd abandoned the halls, he'd left it all behind him, wanting nothing to do with the world where his heart had been broken so resoundingly. But that _was_ sixteen years ago. He willed himself to be over it and to look at this world from his present perspective, rather than through the prism of the fraught past.

He brought a more mature eye, a more critical approach to the performances now. Some things had changed - certainly the names and the faces, and the songs and the routines. The humour was sharper. The wit and style of the London stage, nowhere more deftly displayed than in the work of the now-socially-reviled Oscar Wilde, had permeated even these distant regions and, Carson had to admit, invested the whole with a veneer of smart professionalism wholly absent from his own broad-based showmanship of yesteryear. Perhaps he might find a place again in this world - the Cheerful Charlies reborn.

 _No_. Foolish thought. Even if he knew where Charlie Grigg was these days which, mercifully, he did not. He hoped never again to set eyes on the man. Or on Alice. But he could see applying his managerial and organizational skills here. And then rejected the notion. He was looking for the stability necessary to woo a woman of ordinary expectations and to support children. One needed something more than a livelihood grounded in fluctuating public tastes for entertainment for that purpose.

It wasn't an immediate concern, not until he made his mind up to do it and had some serious prospects, but eventually he would have to tell His Lordship. That would be very difficult indeed. He owed the family, especially His Lordship's father, so much. And he felt the burden of expectation that had long rested on his shoulders, from the time he had discerned that Mr. Finch was grooming him, on His Lordship's father's instructions, for the post of butler at Downton Abbey. No one had ever challenged this plan for his future, not even Carson himself. But did that mean he could never abandon it? that he was bound to service, and here at Downton, all of his days because His Lordship's father had ordained it so? Carson did not think so. Nor would Lord Grantham think so, he of the so-congenial disposition. There were higher callings than service, and family was one of them. Robert Crawley would understand.

It would be harder to leave His Lordship than to leave the work. This was almost a startling revelation for Carson, as he thought about it. They were not friends, he and His Lordship, and never could be. But they worked well together. They got on. And there _was_ an element of...if not friendship, then perhaps cameraderie-in-arms about their relationship. There was more than work between them. He would miss that.

If his new preoccupation pushed the goings-on of the wider world to the peripheries, it also distracted him from his usual concerns. Mrs. Hughes noticed. One afternoon when he failed to turn up for tea in the servants' hall - ever since she had come to Downton and enlivened the table talk, he had resumed the habit - she brought him in a tray.

"Are you quite all right, Mr. Carson?"

It was the prerogative of the housekeeper to inquire after everyone's health, _even_ the butler's, and to make work-related decisions when health became an issue. But he reacted defensively, knowing that he had not been himself.

"Perfectly fine!" he snapped peremptorily. "I've no idea why you would ask."

His remark was not a question and he did not expect a response, but she gave one anyway, undeterred by his caustic tone. "Well, for one you've not berated me for bringing in your tea when it is the work of a kitchen maid. And for another, you didn't stand when I came in. Nor did you thank me, which is not like you at all."

His first impulse was to snap again, but habits of courtesy and consideration long ingrained compelled him to contrition. "I beg your pardon, Mrs. Hughes," he said, in a more temperate voice, getting to his feet as he spoke. He'd gotten the hang of her name, finally, having had a time of it switching from Elsie, as she had been known as a housemaid, to the more formal title accorded the housekeeper. "Thank you for bringing the tea. I hadn't noticed the time." That in itself was, perhaps, an admission that not all was well. The butler of Downton Abbey was renowned for his punctuality, as well as his punctiliousness. When she continued to stare at him, he realized she was waiting for a reasonable response to her original question. "I am well," he said firmly. "Only a bit distracted."

For a long moment she stared intently at him, as though to give him an opportunity to recant or expand, and then she silently withdrew. _Women_ , he thought. _Are you that sure you want a wife, Charlie?_

Miss Mary also noticed his behaviour. "Is someone sick, Mr. Carson?" She asked this one afternoon over their tea.

He was puzzled. "No one's sick," he said, looking at her curiously. "Why do you ask?"

She sipped her drink, her wide, dark eyes fixed on him over the rim of her blue-and-white china cup. "You're acting like when Mrs. Dakin went away."

There was no fooling a child, not that he'd been trying. He just wasn't aware that she was so observant of his moods. He smiled. "No, nothing like that. I've...I've got a few things on my mind. That's all." As his eyes rested on her, it occurred to him that in leaving Downton, he would be leaving her, too. How had he not considered this? His heart felt a wrench.

"Papa is very worried all the time, too," she went on. "'Cares of the world,' he says. What are the 'cares of the world,' Mr. Carson?" She looked at him in expectation. He answered her questions.

"His Lordship has responsibilities that extend beyond your family, and even beyond Downton, Miss Mary," he said slowly.

"Such as?"

He thought for a moment. "Well, before he became the Earl of Grantham, His Lordship was a soldier. He was in the army. He follows what the army is doing across the Empire and sometimes that troubles him. And, as Lord Grantham, he sits in the House of Lords." He had already explained to her that the Lords was the appointed upper chamber of Parliament, populated by the noble families of the realm, among whom the Crawleys numbered. "There are some very serious questions before the government at the moment."

"Like what?" she persisted.

"Well, such as whether it is worth a war to ensure that British men may exercise their right to self-government the world over." That was, after all, the principle behind the troubles in the South African republics.

Miss Mary struggled with his words. "Do you think it is, Mr. Carson?" she asked at length, having at least made structural sense of his statement, if not achieving understanding of its substance.

That was the question. Was the principle worth the price? "I don't know," he said, not wholly focused on the great national matter. He did not expect this answer to satisfy her. Didn't children - didn't everyone - like things to be black and white? And yet she was smiling. "Why're you so pleased?" he asked, unable to keep from smiling himself. She had such a charming away about her.

"It's only that it's nice to know grown-ups don't know everything, Mr. Carson," she said, looking him straight in the eye, fully aware of her impertinence and supremely confident that he would not rebuke her for it.

He laughed aloud, startling passers-by in the passage who rarely knew Mr. Carson to unbend.

"That's the truth of it," he said agreeably, and was relieved to be able to admit uncertainty to someone. "Now, tell me what you've learned to say in French this week. I know a little French, myself."

 **Storm Clouds**

If exploring options for a different future were so distracting as to have drawn the attention of Mrs. Hughes and Miss Mary, then surely His Lordship had noticed as well. This would have troubled Carson, for the essence of doing things properly was that no one need take any notice of them at all. But His Lordship had his own preoccupations and, as Carson had intimated to Miss Mary, they did indeed revolve around events in the Boer republics in South Africa in which he had an interest beyond that of a concerned subject of the King. Carson had let the events of those remote places drift to the back of his consciousness, but he could not forget them entirely, not when His Lordship was so agitated over them.

In September, while Carson had been reeling over Mrs. Yardley's announcement and beginning to ponder, perhaps, a different future for himself, His Lordship had gotten quite exercised over the situation of the _uitlanders_. As Her Ladyship was less interested in British imperial ventures and hardly ever appeared at the breakfast table anyway, Carson absorbed the currents of His Lordship's rising agitation.

"Chamberlain is off the rails in the matters of electoral reform," Robert Crawley had thundered, shaking _The Times_. _"And_ his land reform program - three acres and a mule, for heaven's sake! - absolutely crackers!" he'd added. "But he'll make his mark as Colonial Secretary. And I support completely his demand for full political rights for the _uitlanders_. Englishmen _must_ have a say in the way they are governed, no matter where they are. _Republics_!" he had fumed.

Carson agreed completely, though this particular issue did not exacerbate his blood pressure to quite the same extent it did His Lordship's.

There was a tension in the house in the first weeks of October, when the Boers issued an ultimatum demanding that Britain withdraw from critical border areas of the South African states, and then almost jubilation on His Lordship's part when Britain refused and the Boers declared war.

"We'll put paid to _that_ nonsense soon enough," His Lordship had said in a tone of self-satisfaction. Carson concurred with that sentiment, too.

And then the news had flooded in of the Boer offensive on several fronts. And of its several successes. Black Week, which saw the British regular forces reeling in three massive losses between December 10-15, 1899, cast a pall over the weeks leading up to Christmas at Downton. Britain had never known such a coalescence of military catastrophe, and at the hands of the upstart _Boers_ , those rough, Dutch colonial horsemen who were no match in an open contest with the forces of the mightiest empire in the world. Only...they were.

In the meantime, Carson had made some progress on a number of fronts closer to home. He had advertised extensively for the cook's position. While it occasionally happened that a promotion within was possible, as was the case with himself and Mrs. Hughes, he thought it wiser to cast the net broadly. You didn't want to be changing cooks with the weather. And it was not a matter of finding an adequate replacement for Mrs. Yardley, but rather the _best available_. The cook, like the butler and, to some extent the housekeeper, set a tone for the house. It was not on that visitors should leave Downton Abbey grumbling about the food. He and Mrs. Yardley interviewed a number of candidates and presented a list of the real contenders to Her Ladyship. Then, at Mrs. Yardley's insistence, each candidate composed a series of sample menus and then invited to Downton to prepare, under Mrs. Yardley's watchful eye, a meal for the family. It was a daunting process, but Carson had little sympathy with the pressures this placed on the applicants. He was not convinced by the choice favoured by Her Ladyship and Mrs. Yardley, but he yielded. As he was planning to leave Downton, it was perhaps more important that _they_ be satisfied rather than he. And it was decided that the new cook, a Mrs. Sealyham, would begin in January.

Closer to his own concerns, he had come on two likely employment possibilities, both in London and both at major hotels. For months he'd found reasons to reject the positions he'd seen advertised, on the basis of location or the unappealing nature of the work or the hours demanded. He'd begun to wonder if he was wavering. But now his reluctance to take action was vindicated, for both of these prospects seemed eminently suitable.

He wrote out letters of application, but did not put them immediately into the post. Before he did so, he meant to speak to His Lordship. There was the matter of a reference, of course, but for Carson it was more about courtesy. Now that he had made up his mind, it was only right that he should make his intentions known to the man he had served so long. And it was not possible to delay. The letters must be sent on their way.

He intended to broach the necessity for a private conference with His Lordship at breakfast, but was preempted by His Lordship himself.

Looking up from the official communication that had arrived for him in the morning post, Robert Crawley addressed his butler. "Carson, if possible I should like to speak with you later this morning on a matter of some importance. May we say ten o'clock in my study?"

As a matter of course, when the two men met in the privacy of the study at the appointed hour, Carson held back on his own announcement, yielding to His Lordship's prerogative. Robert Crawley stood in the middle of the room so that they were eye to eye for this exchange. This struck Carson as a little odd, for His Lordship invariably sat at his desk when they were discussing the business of the house.

"I know you've been following the war in South Africa as closely as I have," His Lordship said, getting immediately to the point. "We're in a very bad way, Carson, and Mr. Salisbury has decided greatly to expand our efforts there. Two full regiments are being dispatched and a widespread call for volunteers has been issued. All of the colonies have been invited to participate, but of course England will raise its own contingent of volunteers as well."

"Black Week _must_ be avenged," Carson intoned. He fully supported the Prime Minister's determination on this matter.

Robert Crawley paused for a moment and then took a step closer to his butler, a movement suggesting discretion and he lowered his voice when he spoke again. "I've not yet spoken with Her Ladyship about this, Carson. Indeed, I only received the official notice this morning. But I want to get things straight with you before I make an announcement to the family."

"My lord?" Carson did not understand.

"I've been offered a captaincy in the North Riding Volunteers, Carson. And I'm going to take it. Our regiment will undergo a month's intensive training here and then ship out to South Africa before Christmas. It's imperative that our forces on the ground in the Transvaal are in a position to begin the process of restoring British honour early in the new year."

This declaration left Carson gaping in astonishment. "A commission in the North Riding Volunteers!" he managed to gasp.

His Lordship frowned a little. "You know of my military training, Carson. It's hardly to be expected that I should pass on this call to service."

"But...Downton, my lord. And your family. You have a wife and children. Surely there is no _need_ for you to serve." The shock of His Lordship's news had temporarily dispelled Carson's usual tact. These were not matters, rightly speaking, of his concern.

"I have a duty to Queen and Country, Carson," His Lordship said curtly.

"Of course, my lord. Only ...it is a war, my lord. And you are the Earl of Grantham." He spoke circumspectly, but his point was clear to his listener. The two men stared hard at each other.

"And that should excuse me from other kinds of responsibilities?" Robert Crawley spoke sharply, perhaps more sharply than he had intended, for the expression on his face softened and his voice, when he spoke again, was more moderate. "I know the risks, Carson," he said quietly. "But this is what the aristocracy _does_. This is one of our fundamental services to the nation. I have been trained as an officer and I must apply those skills when and where they are required. And is not our nation in serious difficulty? Good God, we've never faced military disaster on the scale we saw during Black Week!"

Carson could not argue with that, not with any of that. He supported the system as vigorously as did his employer, and he knew, too, that His Lordship was right about the aristocracy. One could only demand the allegiance of the masses when the elites played their part fully and without reservation.

At the butler's expression of resignation, His Lordship's demeanour softened further. "You understand," he said. It wasn't a question.

Carson nodded.

His Lordship was silent for a moment, letting Carson digest the news. "I can't tell you what a relief it is to me to know that you will be here, holding the fort so to speak," Robert said earnestly. "You'll be in charge of the house, of course, with authority to make whatever decisions you think necessary for its welfare, for the duration of the conflict. But..." He let the word hang in the air.

Carson saw emotion welling in His Lordship's eyes and felt the intensity of the charge that was being vested upon him.

"But I'm also counting on you to look after my family, Carson. I can't know...no one can...what may happen in South Africa. There's no one else I could trust with all that is important to me. I know that...well, that you'll take care of them, come what may."

His Lordship did not appear to require a response. He regained control of the feelings that had swirled to the surface as he issued this commission and the smooth impassive expression with which Robert Crawley usually met the world returned to his face. Carson could not make the same claim to equilibrium.

"Well." His Lordship cleared his throat. "I'm going now to speak with Her Ladyship, Carson. As you can imagine, that's going to be a difficult conversation. She's unlikely to receive this news with anything like your equanimity." He nodded and then withdrew, leaving Carson to come to terms with the great responsibility - and burden - that had just been placed on his shoulders.

 **Where Your Heart Is**

After the servants' dinner he withdrew to his pantry. He was aware of the looks that passed between the cook and the housekeeper as he did so. He'd been too quiet at dinner and Mrs. Yardley and Mrs. Hughes had noticed. But he gave them no satisfaction, too concerned with his own troubles. Closing over the pantry door, he crossed the floor to his desk and slumped heavily into his chair. He'd been going round and round on it since his conversation with His Lordship hours earlier and come to no resolution.

Was it not a problem like any other? Was it not a matter of identifying and assessing the advantages and disadvantages and drawing the appropriate conclusion? But no. Somehow _this_ quandary eluded such a clinical analysis.

His Lordship had not asked for his cooperation. He had just assumed. _As well he might_ , Carson chided himself. _You've given him no reason to think otherwise. You've told him nothing of your own hopes and dreams. He's only ever known you, seen you, as his stalwart lieutenant in the preservation of Downton Abbey and of the Crawley family. No one save His Lordship has ever been more dedicated to those tasks_.

But to stay on... He had seized on the notion of seeking a different life and the opportunity to do so, in the form of promising alternative employment, was within his grasp. He would secure offers for both those positions if he sent the letters, he knew it. _If_. This was his chance, wasn't it? His Lordship would still give him a good reference, even in his disappointment. It was all still possible. He could go up now, intercept His Lordship before he retired for the night, and put it to him. Why must he put his own life on hold because His Lordship felt obliged to respond to the call of Queen and country?

And yet he could feel no resentment toward Robert Crawley either for the decision he had taken or for the assumptions he had made of his butler. That was the nature of their relationship and Carson had embraced it as readily, if not more so, than His Lordship himself. But was he prepared to surrender the dream he had been cultivating of late of a family, of loved ones gathered around his own hearth?

He heard the tap on his door as though from a great distance and turned his head only very slowly in that direction, expecting to see one or the other of the staff there, primed with some mundane question. But it was not one of the downstairs denizens and this realization jarred him from his own glum reveries.

"Miss Mary!"

It was almost eleven o'clock, long past the child's bedtime. She looked like a little wraith, standing there in the doorway in her flowing white nightgown and embroidered green robe, her wide eyes fixed on him.

"What are you doing here?" He heard the gruffness in his voice. "Come in." And he got up and went to her as she slipped into his office. He held out a hand and she eagerly took it and followed him to the chairs before the desk. She sat in one, he in the other, right beside her. In the dimness of the firelight emanating from the grate in the corner, he could see that she was distressed. Was that the glint of a tear in her eye?

"What is it?" he asked, his tone gentle now.

He was startled when tears began to spill over her cheeks. Miss Mary Crawley was not a crier.

"It's Papa, Mr. Carson! He's going away tomorrow and Nanny says he may be gone for a very long time!"

Of course. His Lordship had spoken with Her Ladyship that morning, after imparting his news to Carson, and spent the better part of the day persuading her to accept his decision - without much success, as far as Carson could tell. And then they had told the children during their hour together after tea. Carson had not been present, but he was certain that His Lordship would have mentioned only the immediate nature of his departure and the importance of his business, but not its exact nature, for fear of frightening them.

Carson had never been anything but honest with Miss Mary. "He _is_ to go away tomorrow," he confirmed. "And it may well be some time before he returns. He does not know himself how long." His honesty did not require him to acknowledge that other possibility, that His Lordship might not return at all.

"But I don't want him to go, Mr. Carson!"

Her very real anguish touched him and he squeezed her hand comfortingly. "His Lordship has many responsibilities and he must attend to them. The Queen requires his services."

"But I'll miss him!"

"Of course you will."

"And... and..." Her tears were falling freely now. "I wanted to tell him that and to beg him not to forget me while he's gone. Me or Mama and my sisters. I went round to Mama's room to find him. But through the door I could hear Mama crying so hard and Papa speaking to her so gently. I couldn't go in."

His heart ached for her sorrow, but even through this he had to smile at her forbearance. He would not have expected it of her. "Just as well," he said soothingly. "Your Mama is very sad."

"He'll be gone in the morning before I'm up, Mr. Carson. And I won't see him again for ages. I must... I _must_ tell him these things!" A renewed wave of anguish swept over her and her silent tears turned abruptly to sobs.

Carson responded instinctively, reaching out for her and drawing her into his arms. She clung to him, pressing her face against his shoulder and sobbing without restraint while he rubbed her back in a comforting way and tried to think how he might lighten her burden. He had never seen Miss Mary undone like this.

At length her tears dissipated and she righted herself, sitting on his knee and wiping her heated cheeks with the back of her forearm, in a manner that Nanny would no doubt have reviled.

"I have an idea," he said suddenly.

She looked up at him alertly. She knew him to be a mender of ills.

"You could write His Lordship a letter telling him how you feel," he suggested. "You may leave it with me and I will place it into his hands directly tomorrow morning so that he will have it with him in the coach. Then he will have something of you with him wherever he goes these next few months."

He set her up at his desk with a crisp sheet of his best writing paper and his fountain pen. Miss Mary understood the latter to be a sign of the momentous nature of her undertaking for she had on only rare occasions been allowed to use it. And then she paused uncertainly.

"What shall I say, Mr. Carson?"

"Write what is in your heart," he advised. It was a vague direction and perhaps too abstract for an ordinary child, but Miss Mary smiled and pressed the pen to paper.

" _Dearest Papa._ " As she scratched out the words, she said them aloud. " _You are going away tomorrow and I can hardly bear to think of it. I will miss you so much. I know that the Queen needs you and I am very proud that you are helping her. But Mama and Sybil and I need you, too._ " She paused before adding, " _And Edith, as well. Please hurry back to us, dear Papa, and never forget us while you are gone. I won't forget you. Read my letter and remember your daughter, Mary, who loves you more than anything_."

Her eyes were dry now as she looked up at Carson, though he could hardly see her clearly through the blur in his own.

"Is that all right, Mr. Carson?"

"It is perfection, Miss Mary," he said softly, his voice catching. He folded the letter for her and put it in an envelope that she addressed to "Dearest Papa."

Carson cleared his throat and by the time she had completed this flourish he had regained his poise and could smile at her once more. He took the envelope she held out to him and put it in his own breast pocket where it found company in the letters of application he had written the previous night.

"Well done, Miss Mary. His Lordship's service to the Queen shall be all the better for having your love behind him. And now, I think, you ought to go back to bed."

She nodded obligingly and stood up. "Will you take me up, please, Mr. Carson?"

Of course he would.

He took her hand again and they climbed the stairs to the gallery in silence. Miss Mary moved with assurance, her wounded heart soothed by having taken action, her spirits undaunted by the darkness around them and the ghostly light cast by the taper he held in his other hand. That had not always been the case. Carson was reminded of the time they had toured the Abbey at night in order to dispel Miss Mary's fearful nightmares. He cherished the memory of that occasion almost above all others.

They had almost reached the door of the nursery when she stopped. He halted as well and looked down to find her staring up at him with a pensive, almost anxious look.

"You won't go away, will you, Mr. Carson? My heart would break to lose you, too."

All day he had wrestled with the question of his own future - whether to go or stay - and in this moment, this unanticipated moment, his quandary resolved itself and he was able to respond to the child the he had loved for nine years as he had not been able to answer either His Lordship or himself.

"As would mine, Miss Mary," he said solemnly. "No," he added firmly, and he knew it to be true, "I'm not going anywhere."

She smiled at him then, that radiant smile that filled his heart with so much joy. And then she released his hand and slipped into the nursery, leaving him in the flickering light of his candle.

Back in the pantry several minutes later, he stirred the fire. And when the flames rose from the coals, he withdrew the three letters from his pocket and carefully separated Miss Mary's letter from the ones he had written. The former he returned to its place of safety, the latter he threw into the fire. He watched the paper blacken and the edges curl up and then the whole of them dissolve into charred fragments and disappear.

When he made a decision, he did so without regret and recrimination. He'd entertained a change and examined his options with care, and made his choice. Downton was his home. He had family here, perhaps not conventionally defined, but with the same calls of obligation and the very same enthralment of the heart. He would not walk away from them.

"That's it, then, Charlie boy. You've made your choice."

He was still staring into the flames, though the evidence of his aborted venture had entirely disappeared, when there was a knock at the door and he looked up to see Mrs. Hughes putting her head in.

"You're not going to stay up all night, I hope, Mr. Carson."

In other circumstances he might have been annoyed at her telling him what to do. But he was too preoccupied for that. "No," he said mildly. "Just thinking for a while. Brooding, really."

She let a few seconds tick by and then took a step into the room. "You look like you could use a friend."

He smiled humourlessly. "Butlers don't have friends, Mrs. Hughes. Not among the staff, at any rate."

This prompted her to frown. "That's not healthy," she said firmly, and then added, in a more kindly tone, "I can listen if you'd like to talk."

"No." He gave a dismissive little flick of his fingers. "Thank you."

Mrs. Hughes shrugged and made to withdraw.

"Perhaps a drink," he said abruptly. _Where did that come from?_ "Would you care for a sherry?"

He had never invited any member of staff, let alone the housekeeper, to join him. Mrs. Dakin would have been shocked by such behaviour. Mrs. Yardley would probably reprimand him in the morning. _He_ would probably be wondering at the inappropriateness of it for days. And yet his eyes were fixed on the housekeeper, his brows raised inquiringly.

For a moment she said nothing and he began to think _she_ would reprimand him. She had a very sharp tongue. And then...

"I would. Thank you." And she stepped into the room and sat, at his direction, in a chair by the little table where he had his tea with Miss Mary.

Though he had asked her, he was nevertheless surprised at her response and at the pleasure her agreement gave him. And he went to the cupboard to the get the glasses.


	14. Chapter 14: Lion Heart

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **Chapter 13 Lion Heart**

"I am bored to sobs, Mr. Carson!" Miss Mary made this announcement with considerable gravity, employing a turn of phrase she had picked up from her father.

It was early afternoon, that fragment of the day when there was something of a lull in the tempo of activity downstairs and he could, if he wanted to, allow for a distraction. She knew it well and had taken to putting in an appearance whenever her governess's back was turned.

Fraulein Kelder. Mr. Carson did not understand the propensity of the landed class for German governesses. Were there no impoverished genteel English women who might serve in this position? He suspected this was the lingering influence of His Lordship's father, who had been a bit of a Germanophile. Perhaps the current Lord Grantham and his American wife dared not abandon the practice out of reverence for him, God rest his soul.

Even as she uttered the words, Miss Mary flung herself into the visitor's chair opposite him in the manner of someone faint of heart collapsing in the face of a fright. Then, almost immediately, and before he could even open his mouth, she sat up abruptly and assumed that formal posture more becoming of a young lady of her class and which her governess, and nanny before her, had drilled into her. Mr. Carson breathed a sigh of relief. He did not want to be responsible for her social graces, though he was proud of her self-awareness. Miss Mary already had a strong sense of her rank in life though she was just ten years old.

"Fraulein Kelder told me I must learn _all_ the kings and queens of England. Can you think of anything more dull? Who cares!"

She really ought to have known by this point that _he_ would, and perhaps she did and this was why she was here.

" _You_ should," he said with conviction.

"Why?"

He had discovered that Miss Mary was not so adverse to learning her lessons as her governess, and sometimes her parents, believed, but only wanted a meaningful rationale to do so. To be told to do something went against the grain with her. But take her seriously, explain the reasons behind a request, and the battle was as good as won.

"They're part of who you are," he responded forcefully.

She frowned. "Like my family?"

He liked that she asked questions and made connections. But then, she was a bright little girl. "Not quite. The Crawleys are of noble blood, to be sure, but _not_ royal blood. Still, they have been closely associated. The Crawley family has served England's kings - and queens - since before the Reformation." Mr. Carson announced this fact with all the pride of one of those directly concerned, for he believed himself as intimately bound to the Crawley family as the Crawleys were to the monarch.

She was captivated by what he said. " _Served_? Do you mean as footmen and maids?" She was half-shocked, half-delighted by the picture this made in her head. "Granny? - a _maid_!"

He smiled at her. "Not exactly. Lords- and ladies-in-waiting, sometimes," he said. "Kings and queens must have attendants and their attendants must be from the upper classes. Your grandfather was a member of the house of Prince Alfred, the Duke of Edinburgh. And, of course, the Crawley men have served with distinction in the King's army for centuries."

"Like Papa. In South Africa." She nodded sagely. Miss Mary was still learning the intricate rules of etiquette, including how to refer to her immediate family with the staff, and was still inclined to speak of _Mama_ and _Papa_ where she should have said Her Ladyship and His Lordship. It was an oversight Mr. Carson felt it still possible to overlook.

They had talked about South Africa many times and occasionally traced the progress of Captain Robert Crawley's regiment across the pink-shaded territory of the Cape and Natal colonies and into the Boer republics of the Orange Free State and the Transvaal.

Her eyes had strayed to the newspaper lying folded to one side on his desk. "Is there any news of Papa?"

He received her query as a matter of course. They talked about the war every time she visited him. "Lord Roberts's forces - including His Lordship's regiment - have had another victory at..." he consulted the paper, "... _Belfast_."

Confusion descended upon her. " _Belfast_? Isn't that in Ireland?"

"Apparently there's one in the Transvaal, too. There's only one way to find out." He set the paper down again and gave her a knowing look.

With a smile, Miss Mary slid from her chair and went to the shelf where he kept the atlas. By the time she returned to the desk, he had cleared a space for the large book. It opened readily to the page that depicted the southern half of the African continent. Miss Mary knew the geography of the area well, a fact that gave Mr. Carson hope in the matter of British monarchs. She had only to be _interested_ in something, and then would readily absorb anything there was to know about it. She had once asked him why King Leopold had his own personal colony in the form of the Belgian Congo and Queen Victoria, who was a much more powerful monarch, could not say the same. He had not been able to answer the question.

She ran an index finger over the critical place names of the recent conflict. "Ladysmith. _Mafeking_." Saying that name gave her particular pleasure. "Kimberley and the diamond mines." Her eyes darted up to his. "I still don't see how something as pretty as Mama's diamonds came from a dark hole in the ground, Mr. Carson."

"Even precious stones and metals need _some_ refinement, Miss Mary, just as daughters of noble families such as your own require a little tutoring to become ladies." He smiled at his own cleverness with that, but Miss Mary was not impressed, rolling her eyes instead. Shaking her head at him, she returned to an examination of the map.

"Why is it taking so long to win the war, Mr. Carson? Don't we have the finest army in the world?"

There was another one of those challenging questions and one for which he had no easy answer. And he was not alone. As letters and editorials in the papers indicated, many in Britain wondered the same thing.

"It is a puzzlement," he said slowly. "We captured the capital of the Orange Free State in March..."

"Bloemfontein," Miss Mary said, with some satisfaction, stabbing at the appropriate spot on the map. "What a pretty name."

Mr. Carson did not think so, but he chose not to challenge her. "And Pretoria, in the Transvaal fell early in June."

"That's where Papa's been," she said excitedly. "Mama's had letters from there!"

"Yes. By all rights, they ought to have capitulated with those losses." Mr. Carson was aggrieved on this point. Fair was fair. The Boers had been beaten decisively in the field and ought to have taken their lumps. Instead they had retreated through the mountains onto the highveldt and resorted to what was called guerrilla warfare, causing endless headaches for the British war effort and keeping Robert Crawley and others from coming home to their families.

"Why?"

He was startled by Miss Mary's query and looked up to find her staring at him with a thoughtful expression on her face.

"I beg your pardon?"

"Why should they give up just because their capitals have fallen?"

For a moment he could only gape at her. It seemed to him that that answer, at least, was self-evident. "The capital is where the government is situated," he said finally. "You cannot run your country out of your hat. When you've lost your capital, the game is up. You surrender."

She stared at him so long that he felt discomfited. Did she not understand what that meant?

"If France invaded England and captured London, _I_ shouldn't give up, Mr. Carson. I would rally all of Yorkshire and fight on!" She spoke boldly, her eyes flashing and her delicate jaw set with determination. "Wouldn't you?"

In the face of her call to arms he was momentarily speechless. And then a wave of patriotism swept over him and he declared, "I would!" It occurred to him that he would follow her anywhere.

"When will Papa come home, Mr. Carson?" There was a wistful note in her voice.

"I don't know," he said, unable to be anything but honest. "When he has settled the Queen's business to her satisfaction."

She mouthed after him the words ' _the Queen's business'_ and then sighed.

He felt her discouragement. "It is all part of the larger world of our country, Miss Mary, in which one day you shall be called upon to play your part."

She deflated a bit at the thought of her absent father and further still at the conclusion Carson had drawn for her. And though the prospect of resistance against the French had momentarily heartened her, the more remote call to duty to which he alluded did not have quite the same allure.

"So I must learn the kings and queens of England," she said flatly, with an air of resignation.

"You _ought_ to do so," he said agreeably. He rarely told her she _must_ do anything. "Consider it an aspect of your duty."

She thought about this further and then her eyes brightened again and she met his attentive, adoring gaze. "Do you know any stories about them, Mr. Carson?"

"Our kings and queens?" He considered for a moment. "I might know one or two," he said finally, enjoying the game.

She leaned forward, placing her hands, one on top of the other, on his desk, her dark eyes alive with curiosity and just a hint of mischief. "I think I might remember them better if I knew their stories," she said, her eyes fixed on him.

He felt his heart give way. "I think perhaps you're right," he conceded, never having hoped to win this battle. "Where did you want to begin, then?:

She sat up properly, assuming the lady-like pose that would have made Fraulein Kelder proud, and favoured him with a sweet smile that further melted his heart. "With Richard _Coeur-de-lyon_ ," she said immediately. "That's French, you know. It means _heart of the lion_."

"Does it indeed!" He seemed very impressed, though his French had long stretched at least that far.

"Doesn't he sound exciting?" she demanded. And then she frowned. "Why was he called Richard, Heart-of -the-Lion, Mr. Carson?"

"Because he was very brave, like a lion. Very much like His Lordship."

She considered that for a moment and he watched, mesmerized, as the thoughts swirled in her mind. "I should like to have a lion's heart then," she declared.

A vision of her astride her pony (she would be riding side-saddle, which was only appropriate for a lady of the realm) and leading an army of Yorkshire yeomanry against the French hordes filled his mind.

"You already do," he said, and his voice caught a little. And then, clearing his throat, he began the story.


	15. Chapter 15: Responsibilities and Relief

**I LOVED HER FIRST**

 **Chapter 14 Responsibilities and Relief**

 **Difficult Subjects**

"Mr. Carson, what's a concentration camp?"

The butler of Downton Abbey was assembling the decanting cradle that he might filter the red wines he'd selected for dinner. At Miss Mary's question, he paused to look over at her. She was sitting on the other side of the desk, in the visitor's chair, and all he could see of her were her hands clutching the morning's edition of _The Times_ and her legs, dangling from beneath those expansive pages.

She was not unfamiliar with _The Times_. He read to her frequently from its pages. It was their primary source of information about the war which had separated Miss Mary from her father and which was, much to the consternation of almost everyone in Britain, now dragging on into its second year with no end in sight. Carson read all the papers assiduously, with the exception of the _Manchester Guardian_ , that radical rag. He wouldn't have it at Downton. He had, in fact, only the other day confiscated a copy from one of the footmen to whom he had issued a sharp rebuke for entertaining such rubbish.

"Why do you ask?" he said, though he knew the answer. She was reading a letter to the editor on the conduct of the war. _The Times_ was challenging material for a ten-year-old at the best of times, and the war always a difficult subject, but he did not discourage her when she perused the paper, though usually he read things to her. This allowed him to filter the contents to a degree. He had been avoiding the controversy over the camps. Some woman - a woman! - named Emily Hobhouse had taken it upon herself to police the practices of the British Army in South Africa and had only recently delivered a report on conditions in the so-called "concentration camps" to the government. And now there was to be a commission, an _all-women_ commission, to look into it all. The Liberals were making hay of it. The resulting political vituperation was hardly material fit for a child's ears.

Miss Mary lowered the paper a little that they might see each other, although her eyes remained fixed on the paper. "Mr. Camp-bell-Ban-ner-man...," she drawled his name, making sure to enunciate it perfectly, "and Lord Crewe think it is a bad thing. But...," her eyes shifted a little to the by-line of the letter, and then she read, "Mr. Winston S. Churchill says 'we come to concentration camps, honestly believing that upon the whole they involve the minimum of suffering to the unfortunate people for whom we have made ourselves responsible.'" Frowning, she looked up at the butler. "What is he talking about?"

He found the corkscrew and applied it expertly to the first of three bottles on the sideboard. "The Boers aren't fighting fairly," he said. She nodded at that. They'd discussed it before. "Our army raised the sieges of Mafeking and Ladysmith and... the other one..."

"Kimberley," she said helpfully. "The diamond mines!"

"Yes, Kimberley. And then we beat them soundly in some major battles _and_ captured their capitals, and..."

"They won't give up."

"Precisely. They've taken to hit-and-run assaults on our positions and to raids by unruly units called _commandos_..."

" _Commandos_." Miss Mary repeated the word with relish. Foreign words appealed to her, so long as they weren't French words. Learning French, especially from Fraulein Kelder, was a chore. But there was a novelty about the South African terms the war had yielded up - _kraals_ , _uitlanders_ , _bitter-einders_.

"They're little more than armed bandits!" Carson said indignantly, speaking almost more to himself than to Miss Mary.

"What do _commandos_ have to do with _con-cen-tra-tion_ camps?"

"I'll tell you. Because the Boers have taken to fighting in this _irregular_ way, Lord Roberts and subsequently General Kitchener saw no other way to bring them to heel than to burn the crops and to empty the land - of food and forage, as well as of people - in order to force them to surrender. But instead of doing so, the Boers have fought on and left their families to starve. That has obliged the British Army to take them into camps - _concentration_ camps, that is, camps where the scattered _volk_ may be concentrated - where they can be fed by British authorities. There are in these camps as well Boers who have wisely conceded defeat but who have then been hounded by their own people for doing so."

"Why does it make people in England angry?"

Carson paused for a moment. He knew the debate over the concentration camps. The army and the government contended that they were a necessity for the reasons he had just related. But Miss Hobhouse and others had shown that the camps were not at all well administered and that Boer dependents were dying in them in unacceptable numbers. Carson was inclined to side with the Prime Minister, Lord Salisbury, and General Kitchener on this. To his mind, the Boers had brought it on themselves, not that this excused the deaths. But it was his understanding, and Mr. Churchill supported this view, too, that the British Army was doing the best it could in unexpected circumstances. No one had anticipated that the Boers would abandon their families in this way. But there was an increasing chorus in the press that maintained that the camps expressed a deliberate policy of extermination on the part of Britain. It was a reprehensible accusation, to Carson's mind, and wholly groundless.

"When you bring a large number of people together in make-shift circumstances," he began carefully, "it is often the case that they catch diseases or cannot be adequately supported with the limited means on hand. People have died in the camps, Miss Mary." The dead were mostly women and children and the elderly, but he chose not to mention this lest she find it too disturbing. "And there are many in England who think we ought to have done a better job." He paused. "And perhaps we should have done." *****

She stared at him thoughtfully for a long moment and then, apparently satisfied, dropped her gaze to the pages of _The Times_ once more, though she did not raise the paper between them again. He glanced at her with mild concern. It _was_ a fraught topic, the camps. He sought a distraction.

He was now fitting a bottle into the decanting apparatus. Without looking at her he asked, "What brings you down here at this hour of the day?" It was past their usual time. He was surprised Frau Kelder wasn't out with the hounds looking for her.

Miss Mary's hands fell into her lap, the paper crumpling. Her shoulders sagged a little. But her great dark eyes focused on him and their gazes met through the intervening medium of the red-purple Bordeaux he was decanting.

"Do _you_ have any brothers and sisters, Mr. Carson?" She spoke as though burdened with a great weight.

So that was it. Another falling out with Miss Edith. It was only ever Miss Edith with whom Miss Mary conflicted. Miss Sybil was a delight to everyone who met her. Carson himself was quite charmed by that sweet-natured child.

In a way it was odd that this question of his family had never come up between them before. Family was a natural bridge between classes as much as between strangers. But then even Miss Mary who spent so much time with him was conditioned to think of him as "the butler," a single-purpose entity. People who visited upstairs had family. The downstairs were a different type of creature altogether. Though this wasn't entirely fair either because even among themselves some of the downstairs were closemouthed about the home lives they had left behind. His had been more of an open book to those older servants like Mrs. Dakin and Mrs. Yardley who had known him all his life. He had not been forthcoming with newer members of staff and had thereby joined the ranks of those who kept their pasts largely to themselves.

Miss Mary's question startled him though, not because she was expressing an interest in his life beyond the role he played in the house, but because it brought to mind unhappy memories. "I had a brother," he said, straightening up so that he might look at her over the wine apparatus. "A younger brother." He spoke quietly.

She always paid close attention to what he said and now she frowned a little. " _Had_?"

"Yes," he said soberly. "He died. When he was nought but two years old." Only a year and a bit older than his ill-fated sibling, he had only the haziest recollections of a dark-eyed toddler teetering across the kitchen floor. He remembered nothing of his illness and death or funeral. Perhaps he didn't attend. Probably not. But he did recall the sadness that enveloped his parents when they spoke of the boy, as they did only rarely, over subsequent years. And they had visited the grave with its own small stone in the church yard. His parents would stand in silence for a long time and require that he behave respectfully, too. This grew easier as he grew older, not so much because he had lost his childish impulse to be ever in motion, but with a growing understanding of his parents' still palpable grief.

His revelation had prompted Miss Mary's eyes to go round with astonishment."Do you miss him?" she asked.

Ever honest with her, he shook his head. "Well, I hardly knew him, did I? But my parents mourned him until their own deaths."

Abruptly he shook off the sombre feeling that had settled over him and bent to his work once more. He was carefully aligning the bottle and the decanter when Miss Mary spoke again.

"Sometimes I wish Edith was dead."

 _Crash!_ So great was his shock that he knocked the decanter over and forcefully enough that it shattered on his desk top. He had the presence of mind to seize the bottle of wine and turn it upright so that no more than a splash stained the desk. Then he straightened to his full height and gaped at her.

" _What did you say_?" Although he was unconscious of it, his voice had assumed the tone he would take with a footman he had caught in a theft. It was the voice of authority and judgment, and it was both thunderous and cutting. He had never spoken to a member of the family, nor to any of their guests, in such a tone. Indeed, he had rarely spoken this way at all.

And it had its effect. Miss Mary dropped the paper and her face drained of colour. Her great dark eyes went round with alarm and her mouth formed an "o" of something that might have been fright. The man before her, always her champion and most zealous supporter, had become someone she had never seen before.

It was the look of her, more than anything else, that brought him to his senses, at least insofar as he heard, as though in an echo, what he had said and how he had said it. But he did not move to comfort her. Nor did he take it back, though he did take a deep breath and put down the wine bottle that he had been gripping.

"I didn't mean it, Mr. Carson." Her eyes remained wide and there was a bit of a tremor in her voice. He had frightened her. But she didn't run away.

He might have said something to soothe her, to erase the alarm in her eyes, but he couldn't. He was too appalled to think straight. But he _must_ think straight. It was almost a physical effort to suppress the revulsion this sentiment, sprung from this sweet source, had fueled in him. He took several deep breaths. And then he sat down, not fully into his chair but on the edge of it. Only after a minute did he push into it properly and then sat for another longer moment while he worked to restore the internal equilibrium her awful remark had knocked askew.

"I didn't mean it."

These words, coming to him in the charged silence that had descended on them, demanded a response. He fixed his gaze on her and for the first time in their acquaintance, his eyes reflected no warmth.

"There are things you _may not_ say." His pulse was still racing, but his voice had resumed its authoritative calmness. "There are things, Miss Mary, that you may not even _think_. Not in jest, not in thoughtlessness, not because you have been hurt. To wish another dead is ... a _sin_." And so it was. This was not a small thing.

"I didn't..." And now tears were welling up in her eyes.

He didn't know if she were remorseful or reacting to his ... anger.

" _And_ a member of your own family! Your own flesh and blood." He shook his head. "And just after I have told you about the death of my own brother. That was _insensitive_ in the extreme." He drew himself up again, preparatory to making a dire pronouncement. And then, seeing the impact of his words upon her he exhaled and with his released breath went the indignation. This was an unprecedented situation. He didn't know what to do.

Only he did. Her eyes had not left him although they were now blurred with tears. Her hands clenched the arms the chair and her knuckles were white. And her whole frame was tense. He had made his point. So he went around the desk and once at her side he held out a hand. Still following his eyes with her own, which now required her to look up sharply, she put her hand in his. The warmth of her flesh on his softened his demeanour.

"I cannot impress upon you enough," he began, very earnestly and in a quieter voice, "how very wrong it is to think such a thing. Miss Edith is your sister and she must, because of that, be very dear to you. Never, _never_ say such a thoughtless thing again. To me. Or to anyone else. And think it of no one. We are all tasked with learning how to live with one another, acknowledging and accommodating each other's foibles and shortcomings. _That_ is a fact of the human condition."

He did not know that she understood all of what he said, but he felt it very necessary to say it. Let her absorb the gravity of his manner, if not the specific ideas communicated.

She went away chastened, with a solemnly stated, "Goodbye" and without her usual smile. He went back to his chair and sank heavily into it. He was shaken, he realized, as much by the responsibility of their relationship than by what she had said. Children _were_ thoughtless creatures, _even_ his Miss Mary. Had he reacted appropriately? Had he said the right thing? He didn't know.

 **Getting to Know You**

"You're quiet tonight."

He was. He didn't even know why he'd invited Mrs. Hughes to join him for a sherry this evening. The afternoon's conversation with Miss Mary had so troubled him that he ought to have taken the time to sort it out in his own mind. And then, at the first opportunity, he had spoken up to the housekeeper. What had possessed him? Their evening sherry was not a necessary ritual. He might have skipped it without comment from her.

"I saw Miss Mary in with you earlier." Mrs. Hughes took a sip of her drink and waited.

She was very good at that. Even as he'd taken to unburdening himself of some of the cares of the day, he'd been able to see clearly enough what she was doing. She gave him openings. Whether he chose to take them up or not she left in his hands, never pressing him beyond the initial overture. Sometimes he held his own counsel. But at other times he did confide in her and found her quite supportive. They did not always agree and that could be aggravating. But she listened, offered advice when asked, and kept his confidence. These were three very desirable traits in a woman.

He sighed. "Things are getting more complicated with Miss Mary."

She gave him a quizzical look. "How so?"

"She asks questions." He put his sherry glass down and folded his hands before him. "She _says_ things. Things I can no longer overlook or put down to childishness."

"She's growing up," Mrs. Hughes said circumspectly.

"She is," he said with a resigned sigh.

She smiled at this and that puzzled _him._ "What was it this time?"

He proceeded cautiously. Trusting Mrs. Hughes had come rapidly in professional matters, but he was more wary on matters closer to his heart. And she had already indicated a degree of impatience with his affection for Miss Mary.

"There was some ... friction ... with her sister, Miss Edith."

"That's only natural," the housekeeper said complacently. "Although she does carry it too far sometimes," she added acerbically. Mrs. Hughes had a good memory and the cowshed incident had given her some insight into the relationship between the elder Crawley girls and not to Miss Mary's credit.

He agreed, but did not say so. As far as he was concerned, they were at loggerheads when it came to Miss Mary and it benefited neither of them to confront the matter head on. "She said something I found disturbing," he went on carefully. "Alarming, really, and I reprimanded her for having spoken so." Mrs. Hughes did not need to know the details. No doubt she would have found Miss Mary's remark even more shocking than he did.

She nodded approvingly at this. "As any responsible parental figure must, Mr. Carson, if the circumstances warrant it," she said, and then added, "Perhaps she was testing you."

That was a thought. "I don't know if I'm up to this." It was the thought that had preyed on his mind all afternoon. He wasn't even conscious now of saying it aloud.

"Oh, I think you are, Mr. Carson," Mrs. Hughes said. There was sometimes a flippant tone to her words which made him think she might be laughing at him, but it was absent from this statement. He breathed more freely.

"And she'll forgive you," she went on, apparently interpreting his being out of sorts to mean that he worried for Miss Mary's good opinion. "She values you too much to throw you over for a necessary correction."

He was pleased that she should say so and gave her a grateful smile. He was fairly confident that that was the case. Miss Mary herself had realized she had crossed a line. And their relationship, always warm, had grown that much stronger over the past year of His Lordship's absence. She needed boundaries and the ones he held her to made more sense to her than the seemingly arbitrary rules of her governess.

And he was pleased, too, that Mrs. Hughes did not push him on the subject of Miss Mary's indiscretion. She might be concerned for his distraction, but she wasn't prying. He was himself of the view that no one needed to know _everything_ , and it appeared that she adhered to this principle as well. It prompted him to be more forthcoming in a different direction.

"We were talking about the concentration camps." Carson did not explain the camps to Mrs. Hughes as he had to Miss Mary. The housekeeper was an avid reader of the papers and was almost as informed as he was on the ongoing agony of the South African war. On more than one occasion she had made what he thought ill-considered remarks suggesting that the Liberal opposition might have a valid point or two.

He expected Mrs. Hughes to react to his disclosure. But she said nothing, only giving him a look that made clear her exasperation. On the rare occasions when he'd seen her with the upstairs children, he'd noticed that she did not talk down to them as other adults sometimes did. Like him, she paid other people - no matter who they were - the compliment of her respect. But she did not share his confidence that children, and Miss Mary in particular, ought to be told just anything, even if they did ask.

"She read about it in _The Times_ ," he added, though he suspected this would not improve matters. "She might have come across it upstairs," he said defensively.

"And?" she said, ignoring his feeble deflection.

"She asked me what they were and I gave her ... the general picture."

They stared at each other for a moment, she grim, he defiant.

"How did you get from ... _that_ ... to Miss Edith?"

"I was telling her about my brother," he said. "To change the subject. And ... she made an ill reference to Miss Edith." That was as much as he wanted to say.

But he needn't have worried. The impassive expression with which Mrs. Hughes had listened thus far gave way to a more kindly one. "James. It must have broken your mother's heart to lose a bairn."

He looked up sharply at this unexpected remark. "It did," he said. "And my father's, too, in his way. But...how do you know of that?"

She came over faintly pleased with herself for having surprised him with her knowledge. "I've seen the grave, walking in the church yard."

"Why would you do that?" He visited the church yard often, but he knew the people there. She did not have that excuse.

"I like to go for walks on my half-day. And I live _here_ now," she said, as if responding to his thoughts. "It's a way to get to know the people of Downton, now and then. Charles and James," she said, speaking the names with some deliberation. "Your parents liked good, traditional names."

"Erm." He was a little startled to hear his given name fall from her lips. It had been some years now since anyone at Downton had used it. "Good common sense names," he said firmly, scrambling to recover his poise, although it was also only what he thought.

"You grew up here."

He wasn't quite sure how they had gotten from Miss Mary's troubles to his own past, but he was glad enough to leave the disturbing conversation of the afternoon behind him. And he was just a little curious as to why Mrs. Hughes was taking him in this direction. He was not concerned. It was harmless enough.

"I did," he said. "My father and grandfather before him, and indeed my great-grandfather served the Crawleys of Downton Abbey. They were grooms, all of them. They worked in the stables." He watched her carefully, wondering what she would make of that. It was no secret, of course, and he'd never tried to hide it. Indeed, he was proud of his family's service. But she might not have known this, being an outsider. What would she make of the regal butler of Downton Abbey now that she knew his antecedents?

"Good, honest work," she said firmly. "My people were farmers. In Argyll."

When they parted at the end of the evening, she going up directly and he tidying up his pantry before following her, he felt unaccountably calmer than he had done when she had appeared at his door. Why this should be so he did not know. He hadn't told her of Miss Mary's great transgression, but then he hadn't needed to do so. The details _were_ unimportant. The critical element was that he _had_ acted properly in the matter with Miss Mary. For so long he had played the indulgent uncle, enjoying her spirited ways but taking little responsibility for any waywardness on her part. But she was growing up and that would mean greater dilemmas ahead. And if she were to continue to visit him - and he earnestly hoped she would - he would perhaps be called upon to draw lines and stand his ground upon them more often. God help him.

He made the rounds of the house before retiring and as he did so his mind turned in another direction. The conversation with Mrs. Hughes had been of a different sort tonight. They had ventured into new territory. On sober reflection, he thought she might have taken him that way quite deliberately as a way to defuse his tension over what had happened earlier. Even without knowing exactly what that was, she had discerned his unease and offered him a distraction. The digression into their separate pasts had given him some perspective and steadied him. This took him a little by surprise. Mr. Finch had told him that a butler's life was a lonely one, that he could not expect to find friendship within the confines of the house in which he worked.

He did not know that he would call Mrs. Hughes a friend. But she had proved her worth not only to the house but to him once again. And they were learning more of each other.

 ***AUTHOR'S NOTE.** Mary is reading Winston S. Churchill's letter to _The Times_ entitled "'Methods of Barbarism,'" June 28, 1901, _The Times_ , page 12.

Britain didn't invent the concept of the "concentration camp," but did use this strategy during the war in ways Carson describes here. In order to undermine the fighting ability of the guerrilla-type forces of the determined Boers, the British Army under General Roberts and then General Kitchener inaugurated a "scorched earth" policy making the land inhospitable for a military force dependent on the civilian population for support. Gathering the civilian population in camps both deprived the Boer military of their supply networks and also provided for people whose livelihood had been destroyed. The whole strategy got out of hand – numbers mushroomed, the British were at first unprepared to feed and house so many, and the administrative and medical services were not up to the job, in addition to the impact of concentrating large numbers of persons in poor conditions with the consequent spread of disease. Some 27,000 Boers died in the camps and somewhere between 14,000 and 20,000 Africans, the latter held in separate camps.

Carson's view here is more sympathetic to the British Army than many of his contemporaries were or even history has been. Many in Britain were alarmed and appalled, and worked to ameliorate the situation and end the war. Among them were activist women - Emily Hobhouse, who investigated the (white) camps on her own, and Millicent Fawcett who headed the Fawcett Commission, to which Carson alludes. Changes were made. Conditions improved. But the camps remained a black mark on the British record and a central point in subsequent Boer nationalist campaigns.

It is important to note here, however, that modern understanding of the term "concentration camp" is heavily coloured by the history of Nazi Germany. The British camps were not of the same fabric in intent, organization, or effect, and ought not to be confused with them.


End file.
